March 27th, 2023, YouGov
It’s time to dill with the fact that Pickleball is no longer just a quirky pastime but a full-blown phenomenon.
Americans of all ages are getting in on the action and discovering the thrill of this paddle sport. Pickleball’s fast growth throws up some interesting commercial opportunities for brands – so let’s explore the audience here.
According to data from YouGov Profiles, an audience intelligence tool, 3% of Americans have participated in Pickleball in the past 12 months while 2% follow or watch the sport. Pickleball’s following is slightly higher among younger age groups, with 4% of 18-29-year-olds following or watching the sport. The percentage drops slightly among 30-44-year-olds (3%) and continues to decrease in the older age groups (2% among 45-64 and 65 plus age groups respectively).
Pickleball followers are more likely to hail from higher (22% vs. 8%) and middle-income brackets (42% vs. 35%) than the general population.
YouGov Profiles provides additional insights, revealing that Pickleball followers are more inclined than the general population to interact with sponsored content at sporting events. Two in five Americans who follow or watch Pickleball claim that they obtain more information about a product after seeing sponsored content at an event, compared to just over a tenth of all sports fans (40% vs 11%). Furthermore, Pickleball followers are twice as likely as general sports fans to purchase sponsored products online (34% vs. 15%) or offline (36% vs. 14%). This data highlights the significance of sponsored content to reach Pickleball enthusiasts.
Pickleball followers exhibit a strong interest in esports, with over two in five stating that it is either their top interest or they are somewhat interested in it. In contrast, around an eighth of the national population expresses the same level of interest (46% vs. 16%).
Pickleball followers are remarkably around three times more likely than all US adults to trust products endorsed by celebrities and influencers (64% vs. 22%). Three-quarters of the targeted subset say they try to purchase products from socially and environmentally responsible companies, compared to two-fifths of the general public (74% vs. 41%). Furthermore, three in five Pickleball enthusiasts compare themselves to social media fitness influencers, which is three times higher than the proportion of all US adults (62% vs. 20%). The most followed sports of Pickleball followers are football (41%), basketball (37%), baseball (34%), tennis (31%) and swimming (27%).
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Methodology: YouGov Profiles is based on continuously collected data and rolling surveys, rather than from a single limited questionnaire. Profiles data for the US is nationally representative of the online population and weighted by age, gender, education, region, and race.