1,027 in the Room: UK Padel’s Next Test Is Better Business

Britain’s padel industry has passed another marker in its development: more than 1,000 people gathering to discuss the business behind the courts. The latest UK Padel Convention put profitability, player retention and governance alongside the familiar opportunities to meet suppliers and test equipment.

The event took place at The Padel Club, Gloucester Quays, on 4 November. A 6 November report in The Padel Paper puts attendance at 1,027, up from 780 in 2025, with at least 58 exhibitors and a sold-out exhibition floor. Those attendance figures represent growth of approximately 32%.

The report also says 81.1% of the previous year’s exhibitors returned. That is a useful indication of supplier commitment, although it does not establish how much business exhibitors generated.

George Modler, co-founder of organiser The Padel Directory, welcomed reaching more than 1,000 attendees in the Convention’s second year and said it would return in 2027. An operators-only gathering had also taken place the evening before the main event.

The questions behind the growth

The organiser’s published programme shows where the industry’s attention is turning. Sessions covered staff culture and retention, revenue beyond court bookings, and governance, safety and sustainability, alongside technology, competition and participation.

The advertised profitability panel included Game4Padel’s Michael Gradon, House of Racquet’s Lauren van der Westhuizen and Padel People’s George Sandbach. The governance panel listed SAPCA chief executive Richard Shaw, Padel Plan’s Sam Thistlethwaite and Layrd Design’s Will Mayes.

Those names and subjects describe the planned programme. They should not be mistaken for published conclusions or recommendations from the discussions, which the available report does not detail.

What Racket Business thinks...

The encouraging development is that the conversation is widening. Building courts is one part of creating an industry; helping people operate them successfully requires knowledge about staffing, maintenance, customer relationships and the costs that continue after opening day.

A trade gathering can make that knowledge easier to exchange, particularly when operators have room to discuss difficulties with people facing similar decisions. Its value will depend on whether those conversations lead to practical changes once everyone returns to work.

For clubs, we would turn one useful conversation into a specific action: review the welcome process for beginners, examine a weak daytime session or compare maintenance arrangements. Give someone responsibility for it and agree how to judge whether the change helped.

Suppliers should apply the same discipline to their follow-up. A long list of contacts is less useful than understanding which operators have a suitable project, a realistic budget and a problem the product can solve. Honest qualification saves time on both sides.

There is also room to share what failed. A session that struggled to attract players, or a service that cost more than expected, can teach another operator something valuable. That candour would make future gatherings more useful than a succession of success stories.

The Convention’s growth is evidence of appetite for connection. The stronger measure of progress will be whether the industry becomes better at retaining players, supporting its workforce and running viable clubs.