If you’re running a pickleball facility right now, you’re probably dealing with more software than you ever expected. Court reservations. Point-of-sale. Programming. Access control. Video replay. Waivers. It adds up fast.
As the market matures, I’m seeing two approaches emerge. Some vendors want to sell you one platform that does everything. Others focus on solving one problem really well and playing nice with the rest of your tools. I think you should go with the second approach. Here's why.
The appeal of doing it all (and the trap)
I get why the all-in-one pitch is tempting. One vendor. One login. One bill. Sign-
ups, payments, court reservations, programming, video replay, access control, all in one place.
But the more I’ve worked with facilities using these platforms, the more I see the same pattern. The booking system is decent but missing features your front desk keeps asking for. The programming tool handles basic round robins but falls apart when you have 30 people and mixed skill levels. The access control feels like it was tacked on at the end.
No company can go deep on court reservations and access control and highlight reels and point-of-sale and programming all at once. Something always gets shortchanged.
And here’s the part that really worries me: if one piece of your all-in-one solution falls short, you can’t just swap that piece out. You’re locked in. I’ve talked to facility owners who wanted to upgrade their programming but couldn’t do it without ripping out their entire infrastructure. Switching facility management software is one of the most painful things a club can do. You don’t want to go through that because one piece isn’t cutting it.
This matters even more because no two pickleball facilities are the same. If
you’re a pickleball-only club, do you really want software that was designed for a mega complex with gyms and pools? If you’re running a hybrid tennis and
pickleball facility, do you want a platform built for public parks? Some of you are focused on court utilization, others on food and drink. No single product can build for all of those realities well.
With an open stack, you keep your core infrastructure stable and swap in the best solution for everything around it. If something isn’t working, you replace it
without blowing up everything else.
We learned this the hard way
I’ll be honest. At Pickleheads, we tried to do it all. We got our ass kicked.
We were building a court and game finder, a group messaging tool, a scheduling system, and a mobile app all at once. We spread ourselves across too many different products and struggled to win customers on any of them.
In 2024, we went all in on one thing: programming. Making the thing that
actually matters to players – playing pickleball – much better.
My co-founder Brandon and I got on the court ourselves, organized our own
sessions, and talked to thousands of organizers about what they actually needed. Soon, the product was matching players with the right opponents, handling mixed skill levels and dealing with late arrivals. Usage grew more than 300% year over year. That focus is what made the difference.
It also taught us to meet users where they already are. We let users sign up
without creating an account and integrated with other sign-up systems. Today,
many players use Pickleheads alongside GroupMe or WhatsApp, CourtReserve, DUPR, and more. Everything works together because we designed it that way.
The all-star team
When you choose the open stack, you’re picking the best player at every position.
CourtReserve for facility management. The founders, Tim and Ashley, own a
tennis and pickleball center and live the problem every day.
DUPR for skill level ratings. They have more game history than anyone else because they integrate with every event management tool.
PB Vision for shot tracking. PlaySight for video replay. PPR for coaching
certification. Brivo and RemoteLock for access control. Pickleheads for
programming.
Each one solves their problem at a level no generalist can match.
"But players won't download another app"
I hear this all the time. It’s just not true.
Players already use multiple apps to coordinate games and book courts, including iMessage, WhatsApp, GroupMe, TeamReach, CourtReserve and Pickleheads.
They go where the games are.
Nobody picks their facility based on how few apps they need. They pick it based on what happens when they show up to play.
A cautionary tale
In 2024, UTR Sports signed a deal with USA Pickleball to become the exclusive
ratings provider. UTR ran a closed system: to get a rating, you had to play on
UTR’s event platform. That platform was built for tennis and pickleball, not just
pickleball.
DUPR took the opposite approach. They closed down their own event management platform and integrated with everyone else.
By December 2025, USA Pickleball had dropped UTR and adopted DUPR. The all-star approach beat the all-in-one approach. UTR was one of the most well-funded companies in racquet sports, and they still couldn’t make the closed model work.
What this means for your club
Don’t buy the pitch that everything has to run through one app. What actually
matters is whether your booking works, your programming is great, your video
replay is worth watching, and your access control doesn’t frustrate people at
6am. The open stack lets you pick the best option for each of those.
And here’s the thing I keep coming back to: facility management software is
painful to switch. If you’ve gone all-in-one and your provider falls short on
programming or video or anything else your players care about, you’re stuck
with that gap or you’re starting over. That kind of dependency is hard to recover from.
Keep your core infrastructure stable and pick the best tool for each job. The on-court experience is what keeps players coming back.
