Membership, hourly or credit packs: which pricing model fits your club?
Each pricing model shapes your cash flow, loyalty and utilisation differently. Here is when memberships, pay-per-hour and prepaid credits win - and how the best clubs combine all three.
How you charge is as important as how much. The same court can earn predictable monthly revenue or lumpy one-off bookings depending on the model you offer. Most clubs do not need to pick one - they need to combine the three deliberately.
Pay-per-hour: the front door
Hourly booking is the lowest barrier for newcomers and casual players. It maximises reach but gives you no predictability and no loyalty hook. Keep it as the entry point, priced by demand, but do not let it be your whole business.
Memberships: predictable revenue and loyalty
A monthly membership trades a small discount for a recurring payment and a reason to keep coming. It smooths your cash flow, raises retention and turns casual players into regulars. The trade-off is commitment, so make the value - priority booking, free off-peak, member events - obvious.
Credit packs: commitment without a subscription
Prepaid credits or punch cards sit between the two. Players pay up front for a block of play, which locks in revenue and nudges them to use the quiet hours they paid for. They suit people who want a better rate without a monthly tie.
Combine them on purpose
The strongest clubs run all three: hourly to acquire, credits to convert, memberships to retain. Steer each segment toward the next - a casual player who buys a credit pack is one step from a membership.
Match the model to the hour
Use pricing tiers to fill the schedule: memberships and credits that reward off-peak, demand pricing at the peak. The model and the hour together decide your utilisation.
kortbase runs memberships, hourly and credit packs side by side on the same courts and members, so you can offer all three and see exactly which one drives your revenue and retention.