Even if you haven’t played pickleball yet, you’ve probably heard pickleball.
It’s that pinging whack of graphite-smacking plastic that’s been echoing around more and more parks lately as the sport’s popularity has surged. It’s a sound usually accompanied by laughter and lively conversation.
Pickleball is the nation’s fastest growing sport, adding more than 18,000 new courts in 2024 alone. They play on a smaller court, so pickleballers don’t have to run as far or as fast to set up their next shot. This makes the game more accessible—and more fun—for more people.
Plus, pickleball gear costs less. It lasts longer. And it’s easier to keep in the car, ready for an impromptu match.
Pickleball Isn’t Always Fun for Courtside Neighbors
When you live or work near busy pickleball courts, the game isn’t always a day in the park. Studies show exposure to repetitive, percussive sounds can gradually erode people’s mental health. Regular exposure to these kinds of sounds makes it harder for some people to focus.
FSorb has the perfect solution. Unlike most other sound panels, FSorb sound panels thrive in harsh conditions. Our outdoor-graded panels can shape sound for decades despite seasonal fluctuations in temperature and humidity, conditions that could diminish the quality of traditional panels.
Indoor conditions can be hard on sound panels, too. After all, not many gymnasiums can control climates as well as offices and medical centers. FSorb panels excel indoors, too.
In recent years, we’ve been delivering our sound panels to more and more athletic facilities, both indoor and outdoor, around the nation — especially venues that feature pickleball.
Sound Panels with the Durability of an Elite Athlete
Whether installed inside or outside, FSorb delivers persistent durability by design. Our durability doesn’t depend on chemicals or coatings that wear away in the sun and rain. Instead, we engineer durability from the inside out.
For starters, we make our panels out of recycled plastic. Plastic can survive decades, or even centuries, in landfills or our oceans before deteriorating. This can be terrible for the environment, but each FSorb panel prevents plastic from polluting the earth.
We redirect these innate survival strengths of plastic to improve the soundscape for indoor and outdoor spaces, including pickleball complexes.
No matter what game you’re playing, this is a huge win, but for pickleball, our brand of durable, environmentally friendly sound panels has several unique advantages.
How FSorb Enhances Pickleball
For interior pickleball courts, we install FSorb panels on the ceilings above the courts and on the walls around and between courts. Outdoor courts use our exterior grade panels on building walls or fences.
This FSorb treatment absorbs more of the game’s sounds, keeping them from traveling into nearby neighborhoods and office complexes. Indoors, FSorb helps keep the sound of pickleball from traveling into the corridors and other parts of the athletic facility.
FSorb also enhances the playing experience for pickleballers of all skill levels. Whether we realize it or not, sound is part of any game. With pickleball, the sound of the hollow ball ricocheting off an opponent’s (or teammate’s) paddle helps players respond more quickly.
On courts treated for sound abatement, players can get a more precise sonic reading. This is especially helpful in complexes with dozens of courts clustered together. In busy complexes, players can struggle to hear their own match since they’re so immersed in the sounds of nearby matches.
FSorb Improves Other Athletic Venues, Too
We also deliver FSorb systems to climbing gyms, pilates spaces, yoga studios, and any other athletic or fitness center that wants to create a friendlier acoustic environment.
FSorb is especially useful in multipurpose spaces which may host a basketball game one day, a professional conference meeting the next, and a religious service over the weekend.
Our panels provide the best sound shaping in the market, and our variety of colors, styles, and geometric arrays give designers complete control over our panels’ appearance. If we don’t have a color or shape to suit a designer or builder, we can customize panels. We can even print logos or other art on panels.
FSorb’s Value Is the Best in the Game
Doug Bixel founded FSorb in 2009 with a simple goal: to help builders and designers score maximum value when they install sound panels. Through the years, FSorb has delivered on this goal, but not by cutting costs or limiting options. FSorb adds value by:
Arriving on time: Distributors around the U.S. stock FSorb products, allowing us to get them to your job site faster and prevent costly delays.
Integrating easily: FSorb’s founder was a building contractor. He insisted on a design that integrates seamlessly with standard building practices rather than expecting builders to adapt our products.
Following local building codes: FSorb also conforms to building codes, making the inspection process simpler and buildings safer.
Lasting longer: With FSorb, there’s no complex internal structure that can break down. There’s also no fabric exterior to fade, mold, or sag.
Being easy to clean: Their simplicity makes FSorb easy to clean. An occasional dusting or damp cloth application keeps panels clean.
Emitting no VOCs: No need for chemical-based sealants and adhesives means our panels emit no volatile organic compounds into room air. This is always important but even more essential in indoor athletic venues.
Creating American jobs: We make our panels in Washington state, using only American labor and materials sourced domestically or from nations with free trade status.
Being recyclable: If FSorb panels must be uninstalled, they’re fully recyclable.
Enhancing mental health: Properly shaping sound makes indoor and outdoor spaces more attractive to visitors. People want to stay in and return to these kinds of areas.
These FSorb values aren’t added values. We’ve built these values into our products, starting with the design phase and continuing through the life of our panels.
Take Your Athletic Venue to the Next Level with FSorb
Tennis courts across the country are becoming pickleball courts, fueling the rapid growth of this sport. Each tennis-to-pickleball conversion opens up readymade opportunities to improve these spaces, making them friendlier for athletes and neighbors alike.
Improvements like landscaping and seating areas for players waiting for an open court make these areas look better.
Improvements like FSorb panels improve the appearance and the sound of the game while also reducing noise pollution in nearby neighborhoods and offices.
If you manage an athletic center that needs sound abatement at any of its venues, our regional distribution centers are ready to help provide the best sound panels in the market.
Contact us today.
At FSorb, we are motivated by improving human health and do so by creating eco-friendly acoustic products. Our mission is to help designers build beautiful spaces that reduce excess ambient noise while calming the human nervous system. With over 25 years in the acoustic business we stand behind FSorb as a durable, environmentally friendly, and low-cost product. If you want an acoustic solution that is safe to human health at an affordable price, then we are your resource.
(844) 313-7672