Eastside Paddle Club in Austin, Texas is providing a fresh approach to pickleball. Its dynamic community and intentional approach to aesthetics make the Eastside experience one of a kind.
Eastside Paddle is an “exclusive community dedicated to providing the ultimate pickleball experience.” The owners at Eastside Paddle are building an exciting community around a high-quality facility. Eastside Paddle Club is a 22,000-square-foot facility with six indoor courts and more courts on the way. Turab Khambati, one of the owners, hopes to install four outdoor rooftop courts in the near future. Amenities at Eastside Paddle include lounges, workspaces, locker rooms, showers, a merch shop, and a full-service bar. The bar area, or speakeasy, helps facilitate community and gives players a “higher-level” experience. Khambati comments that players appreciate the convenient in-house bar; players can get their competition and conversation in the same place. Eastside Paddle also has a mezzanine viewing deck for enjoying refreshments and watching pickleball.
Two years ago, Turab fell in love with pickleball. After talking the concept over with his friend Adrian Montoya, the two decided to start Eastside Paddle. From the beginning, the owners meant for Eastside to have a strong community with a clear identity. They wanted Eastside Paddle to be a community that people wanted to be a part of. They pursued this goal by designing an exclusive, one-of-a-kind, pickleball experience. Eastside Paddle is not just a building; it is a culture. Khambati remarks that the goal of Eastside was to “break the barriers” and “separate” from the aesthetic conventions of the pickleball world. In this sense, Eastside is as much a work of art as it is a business.
Every aspect of the facility is marked by a luxury finish—exposed red brick and black marble line the whole facility. The locker rooms, showers, lounges, and especially the speakeasy give the impression of a ritzy downtown scene. The courts themselves might remind players of luxury tennis courts. The owners designed the court areas with lots of green in reminiscence of the Wimbledon courts.
Eastside Paddle Club had its soft opening in November of 2023 for building and gauging public interest. The owners were hoping for a high volume turnout, but the beginning phases were slow-moving. Khambati says, “It was honestly quite frightening.” Despite the slow start, the owners pressed on and started to see their numbers increase in December and January. This past month, Eastside celebrated its first anniversary and now has a membership base of about 450 members. Things are speeding up at Eastside. In the past year, Khambati and Montoya have brought in three more partners to partake in the Eastside mission.
The owners at Eastside Paddle learned many lessons during their first year of operation. They sought help from a variety of consultants and pickleball businessmen. Khambati reports that a lot of the advice they got was helpful, but a lot of it was not. One of the biggest lessons he and his partner learned was the importance of gleaning good advice from their consultants: “I think the biggest thing was just taking the good and the bad and then taking the best parts of it.”
This holiday season, Eastside Paddle is fostering the spirit of giving by participating in a Salvation Army Angel Tree program. The Angel Tree program aims to provide gifts for kids in need this Christmas season. Eastside Paddle has a large Christmas tree in the lobby with all kinds of gift requests written on cards and hung on the tree. There is also a decorated box in the corner for gift donations. Those who want to donate to the cause can buy Christmas present items and put them in the donation box or “adopt an angel” by purchasing one of the requested gifts and putting them under the tree. All kinds of fun gifts are being given like Barbies, legos, bikes, and Star Wars figures.
The members at Eastside Paddle are joining together in the spirit of generosity to help make Christmas a more joyful time for kids in Austin. Khambati says that the members are excited to give back; it’s “kind of a no-brainer to partake in something like that and give back to the kids.”
When it comes to the success of Eastside’s community, Khambati credits it to a variety of factors including branding, non-registered play options, attractive aesthetics, and savvy sponsor relations.
The folks at Eastside are anticipating the opening of a new location in Austin in the near future. If all goes well, the facility will sport double the courts with indoor and outdoor options. As Eastside grows, its owners hope to expand outside of Austin: “We’re trying to cement our spot in Austin, and then eventually the goal will be to franchise this thing out.” The owners hope to strike a balance between ambitious and prudent business moves.
As is the case at Eastside Paddle Club, the pickleball world often favors those who take risks and break with pickleball’s conventions in fresh, exciting ways.
