PICKLR opens membership sales for its first Japan venue, a seven-court indoor facility in Toyosu

Nippon Pickleball Holdings Co., Ltd. said it has begun taking membership applications, from 23 July, for PICKLR Tokyo Toyosu, which it describes as Japan's first permanent PICKLR venue, according to a release distributed via PR TIMES. The facility, opening in September in Koto Ward's Toyosu district, will hold seven PICKLR & PPA Tour-standard hardcourts in a fully indoor, climate-controlled space of about 1,850 square metres, with a 30-space parking garage, locker rooms, a pro shop and a lounge.

Membership comes in three tiers. A PLAY plan (¥33,000 joining fee, ¥22,000 a month) covers a single club with discounted advance bookings; an UNLIMITED plan (¥55,000 joining, ¥33,000 a month) adds nationwide access and monthly guest passes; and a PRO plan — capped at 100 members, at ¥330,000 to join and ¥66,000 a month — adds AI-assisted coaching, an annual paddle fitting and eight guest passes a month. The company is also offering corporate plans built around team-building and client entertainment.

PICKLR Tokyo Toyosu will be the second dedicated pickleball venue to open in central Tokyo this summer. Sansan, working with Asics, opened a seven-court facility — three indoor, four outdoor — in Ikebukuro on 10 July, which it called Tokyo's first large-scale dedicated pickleball facility, according to a separate PR TIMES release. Two operators committing to purpose-built Tokyo courts within two weeks of each other suggests the category — still tiny by US standards, where pickleball's player base grew from roughly 4.2 million in 2020 to 24.3 million in 2025, PICKLR's release said — is now being treated as a genuine commercial-real-estate tenant class in Japan, not just a fitness-studio sideline.

The two operators are positioning differently. Sansan's Ikebukuro venue pairs courts with an Asics retail and rental tie-up built around footfall and brand exposure; PICKLR's Toyosu venue leans the other way, treating access itself as the scarce good, with a membership-only PRO tier capped at 100 people and priced like a private members' club rather than a sports centre. That is a Promotion bet as much as a Product one: selling exclusivity and coaching, not just court time, to a wealthier slice of Tokyo's newly pickleball-curious. Whether Tokyo's demand is deep enough to fill two purpose-built venues within a few kilometres of each other by year end is the open question neither release addresses.