Tennis Trainer Ball Machine

Several Members have expressed the view that they would like the facility of a tennis trainer ball machine to be available at the club.

This could be very useful for practicing alone and/or for coaching purposes when appropriate. Also, as we have electricity in the hut – it will be easy to recharge.

We have looked into the cost of tennis ball machines – and they are upwards of about £1000 (e.g., tennis tutor Prolite).

We have also sought to achieve some grant funding for a ball machine but to date this has not been successful.

Several members who are interested in using a tennis ball machine have indicated that they would be prepared to donate a sum of money to make it happen.

The reason for this post is to try and estimate the amount of interest in the club for acquiring a ball machine and also to find out who might be prepared to help fund it.

One idea that may be possible to get things moving on this is if there are enough people who would be prepared to put some money into a pot (hopefully with some limited input from club funds as well) – to buy the ball machine – we could then make a small charge when it is used (say £5) – to gradually recoup the money – and pay people back who originally donated cash. We would need to have some kind of booking system for the machine (possibly on the court booking page) so that we know when to collect any machine hire fee).

We have produced a google form and would appreciate your views on this and whether you would be prepared to make a contribution based on the above idea. We understand completely that not everybody will be interested or will have the funds to make a contribution. It can be completed anonymously if you prefer.

Here is a link to the Google Form