The first batch of badminton enthusiasts who returned to the county town to open badminton courts are in extremely fierce competition.
The Trend of Opening Badminton Courts Reaches the County
At the beginning of the year, Xu Yidi, a badminton enthusiast, quit his job in Beijing and returned to his hometown, a small county in Hebei. He unexpectedly found that several new badminton courts were being renovated simultaneously.
Xu Yidi has been playing badminton for more than a decade. In his memory, there were no professional badminton courts in his hometown. There was only a comprehensive stadium built by the government, which was open to the public for free. It had a total of four badminton courts, two of which were dedicated to badminton, and the other two were shared with the basketball court. Xu Yidi has a nephew who loves playing badminton. Every weekend, he and his friends would get up early to grab a court at the stadium. If they were a little late, they wouldn't be able to get one.
But in less than half a year, five badminton courts opened in a rush in his hometown, with a total of 46 courts. Even the basketball court that Xu Yidi's nephew often went to before converted half of its space into badminton courts.
This also gave Xu Yidi, who had returned to his hometown, the "freedom to play badminton." You know, in Beijing, it cost at least 100 yuan to book a court for an hour. During peak playing hours on weekday evenings or weekends, it could even cost nearly 200 yuan. In his hometown, the price was only one-tenth of that in Beijing. It cost 10 yuan for individual players and 20 yuan to book a court. Every week, Xu Yidi would drag his family members to play badminton for three days and could choose the court at will. If one court was crowded, they would drive to another court with fewer people.
Many badminton enthusiasts in the county have experienced the sweet transformation from "hard to find a court" to "difficult to choose" this year.
Image source: Unsplash
When Xia Mu, a girl born in 2004, returned to her hometown, Qichun County, Huanggang City, Hubei Province, last summer, she could only go to two local badminton courts to play. This year, her options have directly expanded to five. Xiao Zhao from Fangcheng County, Nanyang City, Henan Province, had to drive for an hour to the urban area to play badminton when she first started playing with her husband in 2021. But in the past two years, one comprehensive venue and five badminton courts have opened in the local area one after another.
There is never a shortage of people doing "popular business" in the county.
Two years ago, a group of coffee lovers who quit their jobs took their coffee-making skills back to the county and started a trend of opening coffee shops in the county. During that time, various "coffee" signs and flavored lattes emerged like mushrooms after rain on the streets and alleys of the county. During holidays, these coffee shops also became popular dating and check-in spots for local young people.
This year, the craze for coffee shops has been replaced by badminton courts. The successive closures of coffee shops in the county have made young people no longer think it's a good business. The increasingly popular badminton has become the new target for young people.
In Xu Yidi's opinion, the badminton craze in the county seems to have started last year. He doesn't know the reason. He just suddenly learned from his nephew that there were many more people playing badminton in his hometown. As a high school teacher, Xiao Zhao thinks it may be related to the physical education test in the high school entrance examination. "It requires children to have physical strength and improve their physical fitness." Coupled with the various promotions on short videos, it has also added fuel to the fire for badminton in the county.
Xiao Zhao's husband, Lao Yang, keenly caught this trend. At the end of last year, while taking a break during a game, he chatted with the owner of a badminton court and learned that the court's turnover during the winter vacation reached 60,000 yuan, with an average daily turnover of 2,000 yuan. Compared with his fixed monthly salary as a teacher, it was simply a drop in the bucket. So he had the idea of opening a badminton court.
He set his sights on Nanzhao County, next to Fangcheng County. He conducted market research and found that there were very few badminton courts in Nanzhao County. There were only a few "three-no" badminton courts in the sports center, without professional lighting, floor mats, and no one to manage them. Not only was the hygiene poor, but there were also no corresponding supporting facilities. It was even a luxury to take a shower after playing. Among the local badminton enthusiasts, some would drive nearly an hour to the professional badminton courts in the urban area, and some would buy badminton nets online and set them up on outdoor open spaces to play.
Where there is demand, there is a market. On March 26, the first badminton court in Nanzhao County, Lao Yang's "Xinyu Badminton Court," opened. It cost 10 yuan for the morning session and 15 yuan for the afternoon session. During the trial operation period, the average daily customer flow in the court exceeded 100. Even badminton enthusiasts from the neighboring town would take the bus to the court on weekends to play.
Xinyu Badminton Court, provided by the interviewee
Many badminton enthusiasts, like Lao Yang, have been caught up in this trend. Searching for "opening a badminton court in the county" on social media, you can see many vlogs about starting a badminton court business, recording the whole process from site selection, decoration to trial operation. Taking a closer look, you'll find that these videos were all posted this year.
They have diverse identities, including fresh graduates who decided to return to their hometowns in the county to develop, badminton enthusiasts who quit their jobs in the system, and those who have opened badminton courts in first-tier cities and plan to explore the market in the county.
The trend of starting a business in the county has reached the badminton court industry.
"Geographical Arbitrage"
The original intention of young people opening badminton courts in the county is similar to that of the bosses who opened coffee shops in the county. They bring the consumption scenarios and popular projects from big cities back to the county and achieve "geographical arbitrage" in the county, starting a business with lower costs.
It's obvious that many of the young people who returned to the county to start a badminton court business on social media are from Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, new first-tier cities, or even those who returned from studying abroad. After finding the increasingly upgraded demand for playing badminton locally, "they think there are so many people playing badminton and it's so lively. Opening a badminton court is such a booming business, so they'll get involved in it." A badminton practitioner in the county said.
The rent in the county is not only low, but the decoration cost is also low. The badminton courts in the county only need to meet people's needs for playing badminton. There's no need to build additional reception rooms, spectator areas, or even fitness areas and stretching areas. For example, Lao Yang's badminton court has an annual rent of 120,000 yuan. Including the installation of floor mats, lighting, and floors for nine courts, and the equipment of shower rooms, toilets, and changing rooms, the initial investment cost a total of 350,000 yuan.
Even if you don't have enough funds, you can choose to "benefit from others' hard work" and develop new business on the territory of others' badminton courts.
Xia Mu found that although the badminton courts in her hometown have opened one after another, the related services haven't kept up. Including herself, there are only three people in the whole county who can provide stringing services. So after graduating from college this year, Xia Mu plans to rent a small space in a badminton court and open a stringing studio.
She asked her father for 60,000 yuan as startup capital. She spent 20,000 yuan on a nearly brand-new stringing machine, paid 10,000 yuan for the quarterly rent, bought some badminton rackets, badminton clothes, and badminton from the dealer, and also bought two small cabinets online. After spending a total of 55,000 yuan, the studio was established.
Xia Mu's studio
But opening a badminton court in the county can't be done casually. There are even more considerations than opening a coffee shop.
To attract customers, coffee shops in the county usually choose locations along the street or in residential areas. Some shop owners, in order to save costs, will transform the first floor of a residential building, simply decorate it, and set up some tables and chairs to open a shop. You can even open a mobile coffee shop in the trunk of a car.
But badminton courts have requirements for area, floor height, and location. The floor area of a standard badminton court should be no less than 108 square meters, and the floor height should be at least 9 meters. There are not many venues in the county that can meet these standards, and the cost of building a new venue is too high. So entrepreneurs can only find some old factories or abandoned basketball courts for renovation.
The location can't be too random. If it's a little far away, it will discourage parents who send their children to participate in training.
People in the county are extremely strict in measuring distance, and their perception is even different from that of people in the urban area.
Yao Xiaopei from Shanxi has nearly 10 years of experience in badminton training. When she was doing badminton training in a county-level city before, some parents complained to her that "this place is too far away" because it took 20 minutes to ride an electric bike from home to the training location. So two years ago, when she planned to return to her hometown, Linyi County, Yuncheng City, from Taiyuan to open a badminton court, she spent a lot of effort on site selection. Finally, she chose an old industrial factory in the center of the old urban area for the badminton court. Lao Yang set the location of his badminton court near the county sports stadium. Those badminton enthusiasts who are willing to go to the sports stadium to play only need to ride an electric bike for another five minutes to get to the badminton court, without additional time costs.
Half of the people playing badminton in the county are junior and senior high school students. To meet the needs of these teenagers, the decoration of the venue must also be youthful.
For example, the color of the floor mats can't be simply the conventional green. The courts in "Xinyu Badminton Court" have a "Macaron color scheme" with blue and pink. In the early days of its opening, it attracted some local small bloggers to take photos and check in. Yao Xiaopei made three-color courts for her "Peiyu Badminton Court," including the conventional green, the color scheme of the BWF World Tour Finals, and the pink and purple colors suitable for internet celebrity check-ins.
Peiyu Badminton Court, provided by the interviewee
At the entrance of the badminton court, Yao Xiaopei also plans to make an internet celebrity sign that says, "The wind that misses you still blows here."
It's Not That Easy to Recover the Cost
After the badminton court opens, various problems follow one after another.
First of all, the court fee in the county can't be set too high.
A boss who also opened a badminton court in the county this year is a complete layman but wealthy. He found an open space locally and built a new venue, laying nine courts with full keel wooden floors, installing more than a dozen air conditioners, and setting up a reception room. Considering the cost, the boss set the court fees at three levels: 50, 60, and 70 yuan. As a result, because the prices were too high, no one came to play badminton. Later, he had no choice but to adjust the price to 19.9 yuan for three hours according to the local average price (15 yuan for two hours).
Even slightly increasing the court fee may also result in no one coming to play badminton.
At first, in order to attract customers, Lao Yang held a one-week free trial play activity in the badminton court, attracting many badminton enthusiasts who wanted to take advantage of the free offer. But when it started to charge, it happened that a badminton and basketball comprehensive court in the county opened for a free trial play. The customer flow in the badminton court decreased sharply, and there was no one playing on the nine courts.
During that time, Lao Yang always complained to Xiao Zhao, "Why isn't anyone coming to our badminton court to play?" Lao Yang was visibly anxious. Opening the badminton court had already cost him all his money. In addition, he also had to stock up on some badminton supplies in the court, which also cost a lot. Just buying two cases of badminton cost 7,000 to 8,000 yuan. Coupled with the fact that he had a newly born baby to support at home, the monthly milk powder money was also a significant expense. Since opening the badminton court, Lao Yang has lost more than ten catties.
In the county where the court fee is only 10 -