We Took the Machine to a Padel Event. Here's What Club Owners Asked
A day at Padel Experience Madrid with the machine on the stand and sprays on the house. What padel club and gym owners wanted to know about hosting one.
Sean Puente, SpritzUp 4 min read
We put a perfume vending machine in front of a padel crowd for a day.
Not a render. Not a photo in a deck. The actual machine, on our stand, in the open air at Padel Experience in Madrid on Saturday 26 September.
The machine, the packages and the prices are on the perfume vending machine page. This post is about the day, and about what the people who run clubs wanted to know.
Sprays Were on the House
We brought one machine, loaded it, and set every spray to free for the day.
That was deliberate. Free took the price question out of every conversation. Nobody stood there working out whether a spray was worth two euros. They tried it, and then they asked us about the business behind it.
The line we ran on the stand did a lot of the work: a spray before you go back on court. Padel players understood the idea before we said anything, which told us something about where this machine belongs.
| The day | |
|---|---|
| People at the event | 2,000 to 3,000 |
| Conversations at the stand | Around 250 |
| The machine | 69.3 x 45.0 x 13.8 cm, 28 kg |
Both of the first two are our own estimates from the stand.
Who Stopped, and What They Asked
The people who mattered were not the ones trying a spray. They were the ones who watched somebody else try it and then asked a business question.
They came in four kinds.
Padel clubs who had invited us. Some already knew us and wanted the machine in front of their own members.
Club owners inviting us on. Several asked us to bring it to their club, or to their next event. That is a different conversation from buying one, and a useful one.
Gym owners. More than one raised the changing room before we did. That was the clearest pattern of the day.
Operators with no venue at all. People asking whether they could place machines in somebody else’s club. That model is what our post on running one without a venue goes through.
What almost nobody asked was how it works. I had expected to spend the day explaining the mechanism. Instead every serious conversation was about the arrangement: where it goes, who fills it, what it costs, what the venue gets. The technology was never the obstacle, which is worth knowing before you walk into a club to pitch one.
Why a Padel Club Fits
A padel club has the thing that makes a placement work, and it has it twice.
People arrive, play for ninety minutes, and then go somewhere else. Straight to work, out to dinner, or into the club’s own bar. That gap between the court and the rest of the evening is the entire product. Our placement guide makes that argument at length, and a padel club is close to the ideal case.
Clubs also tend to have the physical conditions. A changing room corridor or a bar entrance, half a metre of wall, a socket within reach. At 69.3 by 45.0 by 13.8 cm on a wall, it does not touch the space a club actually sells.
And a club knows its members by name. I think that matters more than raw numbers. A machine in a club of five hundred regulars gets used by the same people every week, rather than by strangers once.
What We Took From the Day
The wall beats the stand. On a stand it demonstrates. On a wall it belongs, which is how a club will run it permanently.
One machine is not enough for a crowd. Roughly 250 conversations around a single unit meant people waiting their turn. Two would have doubled the hands-on time.
Book the follow-up while they are still smelling their wrist. The best conversations happened right at the machine. Getting the call in the diary there and then beat anything sent on Monday.
If You Run a Club and You Are Reading This
The arrangement is simple, and it is the one we spent the day explaining.
You do not have to pay for the machine. An operator buys it, places it in your club and keeps the revenue. What you get is an amenity for your members and the screen, which can carry your own branding between sprays. Or you buy it yourself and keep everything it takes.
If you want the numbers behind either version, our post on what to charge per spray has the arithmetic, and the calculator will take your own footfall.
The Short Version
One machine, one day, a couple of thousand people and around 250 conversations. Padel clubs and gyms asked the same question, and it was not how it works. It was where it goes and who pays.
P.S. If your club asked us to come, we are working through the list. The machine travels well, and it turns out that is most of the pitch.
Questions people ask
Can you put a perfume vending machine in a padel club?
Yes. It is wall-mounted, needs about half a metre of wall and a socket, and takes no floor space. At the event we ran it on a stand, because you cannot fix to a wall in a venue you are visiting for a weekend.
What did club owners ask about?
Where it goes, who fills it, what it costs and what the club gets for hosting it. Almost nobody asked how the machine works. The questions were about the arrangement, not the technology.
Do gyms want one in the changing room?
Several gym owners raised the changing room before we did. That is one day of conversations in one city, so treat it as a signal worth following rather than a measured fact.
Does the club have to pay for the machine?
Not if an operator places it. The operator buys the machine and keeps the revenue, and the club gets the amenity and the screen. A club can also buy its own and keep everything it takes.
Looking at buying one?
SpritzUp machines are sold outright — no franchise, no monthly fee, no revenue share, and you source your own fragrance.
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