Looking to spice up the event selection at your club? Look no further than this special feature. This article will highlight three different clubs from around the country: Paddle Up (St. Louis, MO), Pala Pickleball (Spring, TX), and Weymouth Club (Weymouth, MA). Each club is unique in its location and business style, but they all excel at providing excellent pickleball programs and events. The owner/director of each club was happy to share their hottest event along with their own personal favorite.
Pickleball programming has the potential to make or break a club, and engaging events are often the key to membership retention. Now, it is time to take a look at what these clubs are doing right.
Paddle Up Double Header Leagues
Paddle Up is a thriving club on the outskirts of Saint Louis sporting nine indoor courts and 450 members. Matt Landolt and his fellow owners devote themselves to providing excellent events for their players, especially the newer ones. For Paddle Up, the key to success is reaching new players: “It’s about getting new people into the club to play and designing programs to get them out there.”
The hottest current program at Paddle Up is their doubleheader league format: “Doubleheader leagues are what people want.” A double header league at Paddle Up consists of one night a week for six weeks; the first five weeks are the regular season, and the last week is the playoff tournament. The teams that show up get to play two games against two different teams each night.
Landolt notices that players love the doubleheader format because they get to meet and connect with two teams each night. He also remarks, “Double headers make the operation of social leagues a lot easier.”
Ladder leagues are Matt’s personal favorite events at Paddle Up. He appreciates the freedom they allow: players don’t have to show up to every ladder league night and can pick and choose which sessions to attend.
PALA Pickleball MiLP Tournaments
PALA Pickleball is regarded as the largest pickleball club in the Houston area and boasts 11 pristine indoor courts plus 8 outdoor courts for nice days.
Every two months, PALA hosts a MiLP tournament, and according to Lindsay Myers, one of the club owners, “It’s the hottest thing going right now.” Thanks to their relationship with DUPR, DUPR gives PALA special access to hosting MiLP events.
MiLP (or Minor League Pickleball) tournaments are DUPR-sanctioned tournaments that pop up all throughout the country and culminate in a National Champion in December with a cash prize of 50,000 dollars.
MiLP events at PALA last for two days. Each participating team consists of two men and two women with a combined DUPR rating of 14, 16, 18, or 20. The rules used are identical to the MLP rules. The tournament begins with guaranteed round robin matches and builds up to a bracket play for the top performing teams. Team matches are composed of four games to 21: one women’s doubles, one men’s doubles, two mixed doubles, and then a final “Dreambreaker” game if the teams are tied 2 to 2. For more detailed information regarding MLP formatting and rules, see the MLP website: https://www.majorleaguepickleball.net/abcs-of-mlp/.
MiLP tournaments are booming at PALA Pickleball, and it’s no accident. Lindsay exclaims, “Every time we have a minor league pickleball event, we have people driving down from Oklahoma. We have people coming in from Louisiana driving all the way to Houston to play.” Part of the excitement lending to MiLP popularity is that the tournaments can lead to more tournaments, steeper competition, and an even larger stage: “What makes it unique is having that culmination into a championship level event.” Another advantage of MiLP events is that DUPR helps market and create hype around them.
Hosting MiLP events might seem like a distant hope for many clubs, but these tournaments may not be as hard to access as they seem. Myers assures club owners that MiLP events are “super attainable” as long as there aren’t any other clubs in the area already hosting them.
Weymouth Club Drop in/Open Play
Weymouth Club is a full service fitness club just south of Boston that provides a lively pickleball program. Jacob Zapatka is the director of pickleball at Weymouth, and he sees quality pickleball event planning as a tool for bringing players together: “If you have good programs, those people can meet other people.”
As far as programming goes, the folks at Weymouth prioritize educational clinics and more casual forms of gameplay like round robins and open/drop in play. These events sell like hotcakes: “All of our clinics sell through.”
According to Zapatka, the hottest events at Weymouth are their open play/drop in sessions: “Most people get excited about how many drop in open play matches we have.” Both members and non members can sign up in advance for open play sessions at Weymouth. This style of play is typically more casual and requires less commitment from players, but it’s still an excellent way to get some quality games in.
Players love to play competitively against players of a similar skill level, which makes open play at Weymouth a success. Zapatka remarks: “People are glad that they have groups of people that they can come to and know that the level is gonna be right on par with what it needs to be.”
The folks at Weymouth ensure the fairness and competitiveness of their drop in sessions by assigning each game a particular DUPR rating. Players are barred from signing up for sessions above or below their DUPR rating. If players don’t have a DUPR rating, then Zapatka provides a provisional skill rating based on their performance in a free 15 minute evaluation.
Zapatka’s favorite event at Weymouth is their round robin format; he especially enjoys the coaching aspect of it and watching his players grow: “I like to see them play and figure it out, and it’s nice to see your coaching strategies work against another team.”
Mixing a little bit of fun, imagination, and creativity into pickleball programming can go a long way. Pickleball is creative and innovative and so should its events be.
