Tim Bainton interview: Epic Padel COO on plans to open 100 new padel courts across North America by end of 2025

Tim Bainton, chief operating officer and partner of the padel owner/operator and investment company Epic Padel, is tasked with running a major rollout of new padel facilities across North America while also steering continued investment in the sport globally. He tells Padel Business Magazine about the firm’s latest plans.

Few people appear poised to play as big a role in the expansion of padel across North America in the coming years as Tim Bainton.

The former British NCAA and ATP tennis player moved to the US in 2001 on a full tennis scholarship and has since built up a wealth of experience in the racquet sports and wider health club industry in North America.

Bainton founded his own firm, Blue Chip Sports Management, in 2009, and since 2021, in addition to being president of his company, he has worked as a visiting professor at the College of BILT (Business, Innovation, Leadership and Technology) at Marymount University in Arlington, Virginia, where he heads up its sports and hospitality programme. In May this year he was appointed chief operating officer at Epic Padel.

Bainton tells Padel Business Magazine that Epic, which has been set up by investors from the UAE, aims “to become the largest operator of padel clubs in North America”. He will operate the Epic clubs through Blue Chip Sports Management, which is based in Chantilly, Virginia. 

Epic has already injected significant funds into several top padel facilities in North America, with the most recent being a $1.5 million investment completed last month into Miami’s Ultra Club, the largest padel club in the US at present, with 15 outdoor and 12 indoor courts.

Alongside other investments, Epic is also poised to open its own clubs across North America as the firm looks to play a leading role in driving the growth of padel in the region. 

While Epic initially planned to open 250 padel courts across North America by the end of next year, Bainton says that, like several other padel operators, it has been hit with significant permitting delays and now projects that “at a bare minimum we'll have 100 courts open by the end of 2025. We have a total of 12 that are slated to open by the middle of next year in various states, and we have LOIs on an additional 50 sites.”

To put that into context, according to Playtomic’s latest Global Padel Report, at the end of 2023 there were 454 courts in the US, although the International Padel Federation (FIP)’s first World Padel Report includes a far lower estimated figure as at April 2024 of 227, with 29 in Canada.

Epic’s first club is due to open in North Carolina by the end of 2024, with a six-court facility at an existing tennis club, followed by another club in the same state in the first quarter of 2025. Others are due to open next year in Virginia, DC, Georgia, New Orleans and Burlington, just outside Toronto. 

Offering a more accessible alternative to high-end padel clubs

Bainton says that while several of the padel clubs in North America are focused on offering high-end facilities to wealthy individuals and other affluent consumers, Epic aims to offer a more accessible alternative as the popularity of the sport grows.

“Our overall objective is to be different,” he says. “We want to be more in line with the organic growth of the sport, so a little bit more ‘middle class versus upper class’ with regards to price points and accessibility.”

Epic’s sites will typically have between six and ten indoor or outdoor padel courts in facilities of 25,000 to 35,000 square feet with ceilings of at least 7 metres high. It will also provide ‘Hybrid’ clubs developed within parking lots and parks. With between four and six courts, these sites will feature roll-out canopies to be used in the winter.

Bainton says a key part of Epic’s strategy is building courts across a wide range of different sites. He explains that while some will be standalone private clubs, others will either be subleased within existing clubs, developed in partnership with local government, or built on university campuses.

“We’re doing this through multiple different verticals,” he says. “We’re converting existing space in swimming and tennis clubs, leasing commercial properties, going into universities, and also buying and building from scratch. We're hitting this from every possible angle, because our goal is to have the largest volume of courts and we want to be the ones providing access as the sport grows.”

Bainton believes universities offer particularly rich potential to help drive that growth. He reveals that Epic has LOIs in place with three different universities to build courts on a sublease agreement, adding: “We haven't even started to scratch the surface yet. We want to be in that university space, to help grow padel as it becomes an Olympic sport and a NCAA [National Collegiate Athletic Association] sport here. I think we're the only people that are focusing on that.”

Overcoming major permitting delays 

For now, though, a key priority is dealing with the major delays Epic has faced in the granting of permits. “We've got over 50 padel courts in warehouses on the East Coast right now,” says Bainton. “So ours is not a funding or a supply issue. It’s a permitting issue, and like everyone else we’ve had significant delays.”

The sites in Virginia were originally scheduled to open in the spring and autumn of this year before being hit with delays which he says have now been overcome.

The length of the delays vary greatly across states due to their different rules. “The reason we're opening in North Carolina first is because this absolutely has been the easiest permitting process – it’s not strategic,” he admits. “The process has taken us four months. Here in Virginia we're 15 to 18 months in and still not quite green-lit.”

Heavy investment in other padel companies

Bainton says such lengthy delays help explain why Epic has invested heavily in other padel companies over recent months.

“We've been happy with it, but the investment part has absolutely grown more than we thought it would because of the delays we've had in opening the clubs.”

Aside from other padel operators in North America, Epic has also invested in the Hexagon Cup, and the Pro Padel League (PPL) franchise New York Atlantics, and is in ongoing talks over investing in the PPL itself, with the aim of being considered to launch a franchise in Washington, DC.

Epic is also backing key players in the padel industry beyond North America, including Swedish padel equipment and apparel brand TwoTwo, while additional investment has been made in another padel market set for growth with the backing of Padel India. Currently the largest padel operator in Hyderabad and Bengaluru, it aims to become the market leader across the country in the next few years.

Bainton says that while much of Epic’s focus over the coming year will be on opening its own sites, it will continue to invest in other padel companies, both in North America and elsewhere.

“I get probably 40 to 50 messages a week, mainly through LinkedIn, pitching something padel-related. Most of it is not really worth dipping our feet into, but there's nuggets we get and we've got a whole team on the investment side that audit these and go through the process of whether or not we should deploy some cash to them.”

As it prepares to open its first facilities, innovation is a further key focus. Epic has developed its own booking app and operating software to allow players to make court bookings, as well as offer matchmaking, NFTs and crypto collectibles, in addition to serving all front and back office operating needs. It has also invested in the padel platform Clutch, which uses AI-powered cameras to track players’ shots and movements and create highlight reels and game analysis.

Mix of offerings key to a successful padel club

Assessing padel’s potential in North America and elsewhere, Bainton believes having a mix of offerings for players will be key.

“I think the best clubs will be the ones with options and versatility, that can understand ebbs and flows and trends and seasonality,” he says. “Having pickleball, padel and tennis involved is a smart option, if you can pull that off, but if you add other sporting amenities it's going to be equally successful.

“You're going to have a handful of people that want to just play padel. But if you want to open it up to the masses, you've got to have other options. People have to be able to pay, play and stay. And the more you can be tuned in to what that consumer wants, the better off you're going to be, and hopefully padel will be a big part of that.”

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