Tennis is trendy: 62,000 new members in German clubs
Tennis is one of the most popular sports in Germany. In 2022, the German Tennis Association (DTB) has 1,444,711 club members. That is around 62,000 more than last year.
by DTB
last edit:
Sep 22, 2022, 02:16 pm
The number of tennis players grew by almost 4.5 percent. The last time there was such a large increase in membership was more than 30 years ago.
DTB President Dietloff von Arnim: "The development of our membership numbers is outstanding. It is extremely gratifying to see that German tennis has grown significantly in two consecutive years. Even if this time was a difficult one for our state associations and clubs, we were able to inspire even more people to play our sport despite the corona pandemic. And that across Germany and across genders in all age groups. This shows that tennis is very popular with children, young people and adults."
The biggest increase is around 17,000 new entries among the 7 to 14 year olds - this corresponds to an increase of 7.8 percent. The second largest group is that of the 27 to 40 year olds with an increase of 14,561 club players.
The Middle Rhine Tennis Association was able to gain the most new members with an increase of 6.15 percent. He is followed by the Lower Saxony-Bremen tennis association with 5.94 percent. With membership growth of 5.7 percent, Saxony, an East German state association, is also one of the top three.
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Germany plays tennis and Generali Tennis Starter bring people to the clubs
The upward trend in membership development has been observed for some time. As early as 2021, the number of club members grew by around 17,000, despite the corona pandemic and falling membership numbers in the DOSB.
This is due, among other things, to the diverse offers of the DTB and its state associations. With specific advice and tools, the clubs are supported in optimizing their work, which they do with passion and mostly on a voluntary basis. The Germany Plays Tennis campaign, launched by the DTB in 2007, recruits new members for the participating clubs. The Generali Tennis Starter project, which the DTB and Generali Deutschland AG initiated in 2020 to recruit members, is also running successfully. The Generali Tennis Starter offers interested parties the opportunity to try out tennis free of charge in a nearby club.
But the numerous successes of the German tennis professionals around Angelique Kerber and Alexander Zverev in recent years should also be responsible for the positive trend. Sporting role models play an important role, especially for the youngest.