Will and Denise Richards, co-founders and owners of Dill Dinkers, a new emerging pickleball brand based in Columbia, Maryland.
A new player has emerged in the pickleball space, and the married owners of one of the latest franchise concepts believe there’s plenty of room for play in the country’s fastest-growing participation sport.
Will and Denise Richards are putting everything they have, including money and resources, into building out their emerging pickleball brand, Dill Dinkers, with an aggressive nationwide franchise expansion initiative.
“My wife, Denise, and I started playing pickleball in 2021 and it was very hard for us to get court time anywhere,” said CEO Will Richards of Columbia, Maryland. “Then it got worse in the fall and winter because of the weather. So, we ended up playing in an indoor facility outside of Pennsylvania, miles away. This place was basically a barn, with no heat and no bathrooms.
“We couldn’t get it out of our heads that we could do better,” he said.
Dill Dinkers got its name from Will and Denise Richards’ college-age daughter as a play on pickleball’s quirky name and one of its more effective shots, the dinker.
The brand has opened four franchised locations in Columbia, Finksburg, North Bethesda and Rockville, Maryland. Dill Dinkers is set to open in Manassas, Virginia, in early 2024, said Richards. It signed a deal to open 20 clubs in the San Antonio area over the next six years, with the first scheduled to open next month.
Richards said he is drawing from his experience as a franchise owner and operator of seven Domino’s Pizza locations in the 80s and 90s. After a long pause, which included stints in IT and non-profits, his career is back to where it started.
Since launching its franchising platform in September, the brand has signed 64 locations in Texas, Washington D.C., North Carolina, Connecticut and South Carolina. According to the company, it has over 100 qualified applicants in the pipeline, including both single and multi-unit franchise operators across the country.
They are all apparently eager to capitalize on the pickleball craze and Dill Dinkers’ business model that features nine revenue streams, including clinics, individual and group lessons, leagues, tournaments and private events.
Will Richards, CEO of Dill Dinkers
“I feel safe in saying that by Thanksgiving we’ll have over 100 development deals in place,” Richards said.
The former multi-unit Domino’s franchisee said it was the success of Dill Dinkers’ first location in their hometown of Columbia, Maryland, last November that convinced them of the growth potential for their brand. The facility is a 15,000-square-foot, six-court facility built in a warehouse. Richards wouldn’t share membership numbers or how much the brand has invested so far, Richards said courts are almost always filled to capacity with players throughout its hours of operation, 8 a.m. to 10 p.m.
To help guide its nationwide growth plans, the Richards couple has formed a group of individual investors made up of friends and pickleball enthusiasts. They also assembled an experienced franchise team, led by Chief Development Officer Dr. Ben Litalian, an industry expert who teaches a franchise management program at Georgetown University.
Dill Dinkers forged key partnerships with JOOLA and Court Reserve to compete with other emerging indoor pickleball brands, like Ace Pickleball and The Picklr. JOOLA is one of the sport’s largest apparel and accessories suppliers and Court Reserve provides software to help manage player reservations and finances.
“Court utilization is a big part of making this work, and what we know is having 20 courts in one location is not necessarily a good thing when you can only pull so many players out of one geographic area and you’re left with vacant courts,” said Richards.
Dill Dinkers’ indoor units are located in a former trampoline park, hockey training facility and tennis barn along with inside a mall.
“That’s why we’re looking really carefully at how many courts we’re putting into each of our locations. We’re telling our franchisees that 6 to 12 courts are what we’re looking at right now,” Richards said. Dill Dinkers has an investment range of $328,961 to $765,046, depending on the size of the location, number of courts and the condition of the space. The initial franchise fee is $50,000 and the continuing royalty is 8 percent of sales.
“Franchising is all about creating consistencies, speed to market and efficiencies and pickleball is the wild, wild west of franchising right now. Everyone is rolling the dice. Who really knows who’s doing it right?” he said. “But we feel ours, which is giving players of all skill levels and ages a chance to learn the game and have fun at the same time doing it in a community atmosphere, is the best approach.”
Dill Dinkers currently has four pickleball locations open in Columbia, Finksburg, North Bethesda and Rockville, Maryland. It is set to open another club in Manassas, Virginia, in early 2024.