Padel club startup costs

Guide · 10 min read

Padel business startup costs are dominated by one capital project: building the courts. Costs vary hugely by location and by whether you build indoor or outdoor, but the categories are consistent, so here is what to budget for and what pays it back.

Courts & construction

Usually the biggest line by far: the courts themselves (structure, glass and turf), groundworks and drainage, and for indoor play the building, canopy or air dome. This dominates both your budget and your financing, and the indoor-versus-outdoor decision drives the largest swing in the total. Get firm quotes early, because everything else is sized around how many courts you can afford to build.

Land or rent

Buying or leasing the site. Rent is an ongoing fixed cost that makes utilisation, keeping courts full, critical to whether the club ever turns a profit. A lower rent in a quieter location can be a better deal than a prime site you cannot fill, so weigh the rent against realistic demand rather than footfall alone.

Lighting & energy

Quality LED floodlighting is essential for evening play, which is your most valuable demand, and it is a meaningful ongoing energy cost. Budget for both the install and the running cost, and remember that the evening hours the lighting unlocks are exactly the hours you can price at a premium.

Fit-out & amenities

Reception, changing rooms, a cafe or vending, seating and a small pro-shop. These improve the experience and add ancillary revenue per visit. Add-ons such as racket and ball hire or a ball machine need a small upfront spend but lift average spend without adding courts.

Software & payments

Booking, payments, memberships and admin. This is a small line relative to construction, and the structure matters more than the headline price. A flat subscription is a fixed, predictable cost: RocketCourt is £49 a month for up to four courts, or £99 a month for unlimited courts plus memberships, CRM and reports, with no setup fee. Choosing commission-free booking software means the cost stays flat instead of becoming a percentage of everything you earn as you grow. See the full breakdown on the pricing page.

Software as a flat line, not a commission

This is the cost most new clubs get wrong. Many booking platforms are cheap or free upfront, then take a commission on every booking, which quietly becomes one of your largest variable costs once the courts fill. As a rough example, 3% commission on £20,000 of monthly bookings is around £7,200 a year, every year, on top of card fees. A flat £49 to £99 a month does not move when your takings do. When you model the business, put software in as a fixed line and put any commission where it belongs: as a tax on success. Our comparison of the alternatives shows where that commission tends to hide.

Stripe fees vs platform commission

It is worth separating two things people often blur. Stripe charges a standard card-processing fee on each transaction, which any card payment incurs whoever you use. Platform commission is an additional percentage some booking platforms add on top of that. With Stripe Connect direct payments your club is the merchant of record, so the money lands in your own account and you pay only the standard card fee, with no second slice taken from each booking. For the detail, see direct payments for sports clubs.

Working capital & marketing

Budget for staff, launch marketing and several months of runway while occupancy ramps; new courts rarely fill overnight. Self-serve setup keeps your pre-opening costs low, since you can build a branded booking site, set your prices and go live in minutes with no sales call and no long contract. A strong booking site, memberships and sensible pricing from day one all accelerate the ramp, as covered in running a profitable racket club and membership models for padel clubs. If you want help modelling the numbers for your site, talk to us.