175 lines
12 KiB
Markdown
175 lines
12 KiB
Markdown
# Padelnomics — Platform Vision & Research Summary
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*February 16, 2026*
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---
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## What We Set Out To Do
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We researched the entire landscape of padel-related online businesses, then zoomed deep into the "calculator → lead gen → supplier revenue" model to understand exactly how it works, who's doing it, what they earn, and how we can build a better, more automated version.
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---
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## Part 1: The Padel Online Business Landscape
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We mapped 35+ international padel digital businesses across 11 categories:
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**Dominant players:** Playtomic (booking marketplace, €147M raised, 10M+ users), Padel Nuestro (e-commerce, ~€60M revenue), GameCam (AI video analytics). The market is booming — Playtomic's 2025 report cites 26% increase in club openings, 7,000 new courts built worldwide, and the sport is expected to continue growing at 17%+ annually.
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**Key gap identified:** Nobody has built the *intelligence and lead generation layer* for people planning and building padel facilities. Playtomic serves players. Nobody serves the facility builders, planners, and suppliers in a structured, data-driven way.
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---
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## Part 2: The Calculator Lead Gen Model — Deep Dive
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### Two sites doing this today
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We identified only two independent platforms worldwide running the "free calculator → email capture → supplier connection" playbook:
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**Sportstättenrechner (sportstaettenrechner.de)** — Germany, founded August 2016 by Jan Prümper in Cologne. 18,400 unique users/month, 90+ calculators, 140+ SEO articles, covers all sports facility types. Revenue from tiered supplier directory (Basic €600/yr, Business €1,400/yr, Premium on request) plus manual lead forwarding ("Angebotsservice") to paying suppliers.
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**Sports Venue Calculator (sportsvenuecalculator.com)** — USA, founded May 2021 by the same team (Jan + co-founders Antti and Tommi). 40,000+ users/month, 1,000+ calculator requests/month, 300,000+ project owners reached in past 12 months. Higher pricing: Premium Listing from $500/yr, Marketing Booster from $14,800/yr, Unfair Advantage from $24,000/yr (full lead forwarding with contact details).
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### Same operation, confirmed
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Both sites are run by the same people. Jan Prümper is the sole owner listed in every Impressum. US entity: Calculator Group LLC, Sheridan, Wyoming. The co-founders (Antti: marketing/sales; Tommi: former pro athlete/fighter pilot, sales) handle the international side.
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### Jan's full empire — 8 sites, same WordPress template
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We found every site in the network, all running the identical playbook:
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| Site | Niche | Founded |
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| sportstaettenrechner.de | Sports facility construction (DE) | Aug 2016 |
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| sportsvenuecalculator.com | Sports facility construction (US) | May 2021 |
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| event-rechner.de | Event planning costs (DE) | Jul 2018 |
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| sportstaetten-finanzierung.de | Sports facility crowdfunding (DE) | ~2019 |
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| spielplatzrechner.de | Playground construction costs (DE) | ~2020 |
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| swimmingpool-rechner.de | Swimming pool costs (DE) | ~2021 |
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| sportnetzwerk-fsb.de | FSB trade show networking (DE) | ~2019 |
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| directory.sportsvenuecalculator.com | US supplier directory | ~2023 |
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All share the same Impressum, same address, same tax ID (USt-ID: DE305156863), same WordPress CMS (confirmed via `wp-content` in source code). He literally copy-pastes the same WP site into new niches, swaps the content, and lets SEO do the work.
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### Revenue estimate for the entire operation
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| Revenue stream | Estimated annual |
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| SVC US — Unfair Advantage tier (~10 clients × $24K+) | $240K–$290K |
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| SVC US — Marketing Booster (~15 × $14.8K) | ~$220K |
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| SVC US — Premium Listings (~15 × $500) | ~$8K |
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| Sportstättenrechner DE — supplier directory (~25 × ~€5K avg) | ~€125K |
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| Event-rechner DE | €20K–€40K |
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| Spielplatzrechner DE (JV) | €10K–€30K |
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| Swimmingpool-rechner DE | €5K–€15K |
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| SPORTNETZWERK.FSB trade show sponsorships | €30K–€60K |
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| **Total estimated** | **~€500K–€750K/yr (€40K–€60K MRR)** |
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Almost pure margin — WordPress hosting costs nothing, content is written once and compounds via SEO, team is only 3 founders.
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### The current lead process (manual)
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1. Someone googles "padel court cost" → lands on calculator page
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2. Fills in project specs (courts, indoor/outdoor, surface type, location)
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3. Email gate — must enter email to see results
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4. Gets cost estimate by email + option to "request real quotes"
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5. If they opt in: provide phone + address for supplier contact
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6. Jan's team manually reviews the inquiry, matches it to 2-3 Premium suppliers, forwards the lead via email
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7. Supplier (paying €1,400+/yr) receives warm lead with full project specs
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Key stat: Sportstättenrechner forwards 492 inquiries/month to Premium partners. SVC processes 1,000+ calculator requests/month.
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### Massive geographic gaps
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The sportstaettenrechner model has NOT been replicated in: France, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden, Belgium, Austria, Portugal, UAE/Middle East, Mexico/Latin America, or the UK (properly). These are all major or fast-growing padel markets with zero equivalent platform.
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---
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## Part 3: How We Make It Better — The Automated Platform
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### The problem with Jan's model
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It works, but it's manual. One guy in Cologne reading forms and CC'ing suppliers. It doesn't scale, can't handle real-time lead matching, and leaves money on the table because there's no self-serve mechanism for suppliers to buy leads.
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### Three proven automated lead models we studied
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**Model A — Pay-per-lead (Angi/HomeAdvisor):** Suppliers pay $15–$100 per lead, which gets blasted to 3-5 contractors simultaneously. Massive scale ($1.47B revenue at Angi) but terrible reputation for lead quality. FTC fined HomeAdvisor $7.2M for deceptive lead marketing. Contractors hate paying for shared, often low-quality leads.
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**Model B — Credit system (Bark):** Suppliers buy credits upfront, then browse anonymized project briefs and spend credits to unlock contact details. A lead costs 3-20 credits ($5–$36) depending on job value. Suppliers self-select which leads they want — feels fairer. But still complaints about lead quality and credit pricing opacity.
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**Model C — Dynamic marketplace (Thumbtack):** Pay-per-lead with no annual fees. Lead prices are dynamic based on job size, location, and competition. More automated matching but suppliers report costs of $50–$75/lead with low conversion rates.
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### The RemoteOK upsell playbook (Pieter Levels)
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RemoteOK (job board, $3.4M revenue in 2024) pioneered stacking micro-upsells on directory listings. When Levels added upsells like logo display (+$49), yellow highlight (+$49), custom brand color (+$89), sticky post for 1 week (+$99) or 1 month (+$299), average price paid jumped from $310 to $484 overnight — a 25% revenue increase.
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Key psychological tricks: options come pre-selected (loss aversion — unselecting feels like losing an advantage), each upsell shows a "X% more views" counter to make the ROI tangible, and pricing is dynamic based on demand.
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---
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## Part 4: Our Platform Design — Padelnomics
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### The hybrid model (four layers)
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**Layer 1 — Free directory (supplier acquisition top-of-funnel)**
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Any supplier can create a free basic listing: name, description, link. Seeds the directory with content and makes it look active. Zero barrier to entry.
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**Layer 2 — RemoteOK-style upsells (predictable MRR)**
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Self-serve, stackable visibility upgrades:
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| Upsell | Price | Impact |
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| Show company logo | €29/mo | +40% more clicks |
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| Highlight listing (yellow) | €39/mo | +65% more views |
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| Custom brand color | €59/mo | +80% brand recognition |
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| Verified badge ✓ | €49/mo | +55% more inquiries |
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| Sticky top 1 week | €79 one-time | 2× more views |
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| Sticky top 1 month | €199 one-time | 6× more views |
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| Featured in newsletter | €99/mo | +120 targeted impressions/wk |
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| Lead feed access | €199/mo | Direct customer contact |
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Pre-select the "recommended" package (logo + highlight + verified + lead access = €316/mo) so suppliers have to actively uncheck items to go cheaper.
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**Layer 3 — Lead marketplace (credit-based, self-serve)**
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When someone completes a padel court calculator, their project specs become an anonymized brief in a "lead feed" visible to paying suppliers. Example brief: *"Indoor padel center, 6 courts, Lower Saxony, budget €400K–€600K, timeline Q3 2026."*
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Suppliers browse the feed, see project specs, heat ratings (hot/warm/cool based on timeline and completeness), and how many other suppliers have already unlocked each lead. They spend credits to unlock contact details. Credit cost scales dynamically by project value — a 2-court residential project costs 8 credits, a 10-court commercial complex costs 40 credits.
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This is dramatically better than Jan's manual email forwarding because: suppliers self-select relevant leads (no wasted matches), the credit system creates a self-serve revenue engine, the anonymized feed creates urgency (seeing "0 other suppliers unlocked this" or "3 already on this"), and it scales infinitely without manual intervention.
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**Layer 4 — Premium tier (enterprise, "Unfair Advantage")**
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For large suppliers (court manufacturers, national installers) who want everything: all leads auto-forwarded (no credit spending), co-branded calculator pages, quarterly market intelligence reports, newsletter sponsorship included. Price on request: €500–€2,000/mo depending on category coverage.
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### The prototype we built
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We designed an interactive React prototype showing the supplier-facing dashboard with four views:
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**Dashboard** — Welcome screen with key stats (profile views, leads unlocked, credit balance, directory rank), a notification banner for new matching leads, and a recent activity feed showing lead alerts, listing views, and newsletter features.
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**Lead Feed** — The core innovation. An anonymized project brief feed with heat badges (🔥 Hot / ◐ Warm / ○ Cool), project specs (type, courts, region, budget, timeline), technical requirements as tags, a count of how many other suppliers already unlocked each lead, and a prominent "Unlock Contact — X credits" button. Clicking unlock reveals name, organization, email, and phone. A credit balance is always visible in the top-right with a "Buy More" button.
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**My Listing** — Preview of how the supplier's company card appears in the directory, showing active boosts (logo, highlight, verified badge), and performance metrics for the last 30 days (views, clicks, website clicks, contact requests).
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**Boost & Upsells** — The RemoteOK-style self-serve upgrade page. All upsells listed as toggle cards with checkboxes, descriptions, prices, and "+X% more views" impact badges. Pre-selected recommended items. A sticky summary sidebar shows the selected plan, monthly cost, and a real-time "view multiplier" that updates as you toggle options (e.g., "4.2× more visibility vs basic listing").
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### Technical approach
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The whole thing can run lean. WordPress + WooCommerce (for payments/subscriptions) + a directory plugin like ListingPro or a custom post type for the lead feed. The calculator forms capture project specs into a database, anonymize them, and display them in the lead feed. Credit purchases and unlocks are WooCommerce transactions. No fancy CRM, no complex API integrations — just like Levels runs RemoteOK on a single PHP file.
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### Why this beats the competition
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Sportstättenrechner/SVC proved the model works (1,000+ leads/month, €500K+ revenue). But they're manual, not internationalized, and haven't touched padel-specific intelligence. We take their proven playbook and add: automated self-serve lead matching (no manual forwarding), the RemoteOK upsell stack for predictable MRR, credit-based lead purchases that scale without human intervention, and eventually layer the DaaS market intelligence vision (occupancy data, demand analytics, pricing benchmarks) on top as a premium differentiator nobody else has.
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The geographic whitespace is enormous — there's no equivalent platform in France, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden, or Latin America. First mover in any of these markets with a localized calculator + supplier directory captures the entire funnel.
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---
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## Files Created
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| File | Contents |
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| `Padel_Online_Business_Landscape.md` | 35+ businesses across 11 categories, detailed analysis |
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| `Padel_Lead_Gen_Sites_Analysis.md` | Country-by-country breakdown of calculator/lead gen sites, business models, geographic gaps |
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| `supplier-dashboard.jsx` | Interactive React prototype of the supplier portal (dashboard, lead feed, listing preview, upsell page) |
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| `Padelnomics_Platform_Summary.md` | This document |
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