In an inconspicuous warehouse on South 38th Street in Milwaukee, workers assemble custom-made pickleball paddles that could end up in all 50 states, Denmark, Spain, India or Singapore.
Those paddles come from PROLITE Sports, a now Milwaukee-based pickleball equipment company that works with Pelican Industries of Milwaukee to build, package and ship its popular carbon-fiber paddles.
The company was founded by Arlen Paranto and his son in 1984 in Washington, where the sport – which combines parts of tennis, badminton and pingpong – was invented. Paranto was an engineer at Boeing Co. and created a paddle shape from surplus airplane floor boards to replace the heavy wooden paddles that were standard in the sport.
The company ended up in the hands of Mark Friedenberg, a Pickleball Hall of Fame inductee and author of “The Official Pickleball Handbook” who is nicknamed “Yoda” for his pickleball skills, said his son Neil Friedenberg, current president and owner.
Neil Friedenberg, who had moved to Wisconsin for a change of scenery to be near his sister and attend the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, took over the company in 2011.
“I was always that kid that was dragged out of sporting goods stores … so I bought the company in 2011,” Friedenberg said. “And that’s why right now, the most passionate part is product development and R&D. I can’t get enough of new technology and paddles.”
Friedenberg started making all the paddles himself in his in-law’s basement and was eventually fulfilling 1,000 orders per month before moving his business to a facility in Port Washington.
The family-run company has continued to grow and recently moved its operations to Milwaukee after partnering with Pelican Industries around 2015, said Pelican Industries president Greg Grant, who met Friedenberg while playing a pickleball match. Pelican Industries specializes in plastic injection molding.
Demand for the company's paddles has spiked in the past few years as pickleball rapidly grows in popularity across the U.S. and the world, Friedenberg said. When the firm launched its LX Series paddle – the first model in the industry with silk interwoven into its carbon-fiber body – in March, it sold out by April even after doubling its inventory, Grant said.
“When it was time to place the order I sat down with everyone and I said … I want you to take all of those numbers and double them,” Grant said. “We doubled everything, they came in and we sold out of those paddles in three and a half weeks.”
The company represents about 30% to 35% of Pelican Industries’ business, but that number could be 50% in the next few years as demand for the paddles grows, Grant said. Pelican recently spent about $8,000 to $9,000 on new pallet racks to store grips and end caps for the paddles it manufactures and is working to add warehouse space and staff.
While professional leagues are popping up around the country as the sport becomes more popular, the company remains focused on selling to ordinary customers, Friedenberg added.
“Police officers, teachers, nurses (and) forklift drivers are all coming to a pickleball court,” Friedenberg said. “That’s PROLITE pros right there. That’s what we want to put emphasis on.”
