The pickleball industry continued to boom in 2022 with more than 35million people picking up rackets as big-name sports stars invested in the quirky activity.
According to a CNBC report, more than 36.5million players took up pickleball between August 2021 and August 2022, compared to just 5million people who tried out the sport between 2020 and 2021.
The numbers, which were recorded by the Association of Pickleball Professionals, indicate that 14 percent of Americans played pickleball at least once in the 12-month period, while more than 8.5million people played the game eight times or more.
The recently popularized sport combines Ping-Ping, badminton, and tennis, and has managed to attract the likes of everyday Americans and celebrities alike.
Pro athletes like LeBron James, Tom Brady, Kevin Durant, and Patrick Mahomes have brought greater attention to the sport by investing in professional teams.
The sport has also amassed a significant celebrity following, including reality royalty the Kardashians, Leonardo Dicaprio, Stephen Colbert, and Bill Gates - an early fan of the sport.
Pickleball's increasing popularity has also attracted a large handful of prominent sponsors including Anheuser-Busch, Skechers, and Carvana.
The sport was invented in 1965 by three dads on vacation on Bainbridge Island in Washington state who were attempting to entertain their children. Bill Gates, who has a mansion on Lake Washington in Medina heard about the sport in its early days.
The billionaire Microsoft founded posted to Instagram a video of himself explaining the rules captioned, 'fifty years ago, I started playing this little-known sport with a funny name. Now it's all the rage.'
For years the sport barely made a dent and was played largely in retirement communities and by the elderly. But that's all changed as investors shore up money for court development across the country.
In Florida, one set of developers have sunk $180million into a 15-court facility, which they expect to have 600 members at its outset.
Some entrepreneurs has opted to combine the sport into a restaurant-entertainment model. Chicken N Pickle and Camp Pickle are two examples of businesses hoping to capitalize on the game craze.
The COVID-19 pandemic was a time when interest in pickleball spiked unexpectedly.
People were attracted to the lower intensity of sport as a way to be socially distant, but together and active.
The sport is also attractive to those with zero experience as it can be learned in just a few lessons and comes at a lower cost to entry than tennis or golf.
Tom Webb, the chief marketing officer of the Association of Pickleball Professionals - a group that represents professionals and amateur players, said, 'When you look at participation rates alongside golf, and basketball and tennis.'
'I don’t think anybody would have thought a year ago that pickleball would be right up there with those more traditional sports.
'When you look at the number of people that are now picking up a paddle and playing for the first time, it is inevitable that the investment market is going to look at that and say, this is something worth us investing in,' he added.
