01 The Paddle That Broke Everything
In David Groechel's own words, 11SIX24 Pickleball was "conceived out of necessity, transformed into an idea, and finally, took form in April 2023."
It started with a personal predicament. Like many avid pickleball enthusiasts, Groechel invested in an expensive $220 paddle, believing that quality comes with a price. Instead, the paddle cracked after only three months of play, four to six times a week. That failure forced a question that the entire premium paddle market had never really had to answer: what does "value" actually mean in pickleball equipment?
He found himself unable to justify buying another expensive paddle, only to face the likelihood of it breaking again in a short period of time. The recurring cost, and the disappointment attached to it, pushed him toward a different solution. The question wasn't just about price. It was about quality, durability, and reliability all at once — and no brand at the time seemed to be solving for all three.
"I wanted to create a brand that would fill the existing gap in the market, offering pickleball players high-quality, durable equipment without the exorbitant price tag. It was no longer about making do with what was available but about creating something that players could trust." — David Groechel, Founder, 11SIX24 Pickleball
Thus, 11SIX24 Pickleball was born — not as another entrant in a crowded market, but, in Groechel's framing, as a commitment to quality, affordability, and trust. The mission was simple and stayed simple: change the game, one paddle at a time.
Where the name actually comes from
It has nothing to do with the pickleball scoring system, and it's not a birthday. Groechel once entered a contest to guess the exact number of jellybeans in a jar. His guess: 11,624. Close enough to win, memorable enough to become a company name — even though, as Groechel has joked publicly, it's contended for "the worst name in pickleball."
02 Who David Groechel Was Before Pickleball
The jellybean story gets repeated often because it's charming. What gets left out of most coverage is that Groechel didn't stumble into entrepreneurship — he'd already been through it twice before he ever cracked a pickleball paddle.
The HubSpot Years
Groechel spent 14 years at HubSpot, working across marketing and AI, before leaving the company entirely to build 11SIX24 full-time. In a farewell post marking his departure, he described trying to bring what he'd learned at a hyper-scaled SaaS company into a startup with people he admired and a product unique to its industry. That instinct — process discipline borrowed from enterprise software, applied to a two-person paddle operation — shows up throughout 11SIX24's early growth curve.
Two Exits Before the First Paddle Shipped
Before pickleball, Groechel had already sold two tech startups: an AI image generator and, in his words, a "quirky text-my-wedding app." Paired with a software engineering background and a finance degree from Michigan State University, that combination — product builder, marketer, and finance-literate operator — is unusual in a paddle industry that's more often started by players and rarely by people who have already built and sold software companies.
The 600-Square-Foot Apartment Phase
The earliest version of 11SIX24 wasn't a company with a warehouse. Groechel started selling custom-made paddles out of a 600-square-foot apartment in Washington, D.C., with boxes of paddles, mailers, and test models taking up most of the unit. He sold his first 100 paddles quickly in the spring and summer of 2023. By the middle of 2024, order volume had outgrown what a side project could support, and he made the call to leave his job entirely and go all-in on the company.
"The pipes were bursting at that point, and I knew I had to pick one or the other."
Groechel has said that as soon as he quit and went full-time, growth accelerated immediately — evidence, in his read, that he'd been holding the business back by treating it as a side hustle up to that point.
03 The Anti-Investor Playbook
One of the more unusual things about 11SIX24, in an industry where paddle brands increasingly chase outside capital to fund celebrity ambassadors and retail placement, is that Groechel has been vocal about deliberately not taking on investors. He's laid out the reasoning publicly in four parts: freedom over funding, customers first instead of an "exit" mentality, protecting time for family over chasing capital, and a belief that profit-funded growth forces better discipline than blitz-scaling ever does.
"I sell paddles to real players who pay real dollars today. Keeping them excited to play is the business model. When revenue is the scoreboard, you don't need a liquidity event to declare victory." — David Groechel, on self-funding 11SIX24
That self-funded posture hasn't stopped strategic partnerships. In 2025, Groechel struck a partnership with television personality Howie Mandel, promoted around the tagline "DEAL: Howie's swinging 11SIX24. NO DEAL: you're still using that tired old paddle" — a nod to Mandel's Deal or No Deal fame, brought into the pickleball world without giving up equity or operational control.
04 How the Paddles Actually Rate — In the Reviewers' Own Words
Marketing a good origin story is one thing. What's kept 11SIX24 growing is that independent paddle reviewers — the people with no financial stake in the brand's success — have largely backed up the performance claims. Here's how some of the most cited voices in the paddle review space have rated the lineup.
Rated the 11SIX24 Power Series a "Highly Recommend," calling out its larger sweet spot than comparable power paddles, more stable feel than rivals like the Joola 3S and Paddletek Bantam line, and consistent face performance with no dead zones. Olson's short verdict on the brand overall: paddles "way cheaper than they should be." 11SIX24 took home multiple Pickleball Studio Paddle of the Year awards for 2025.
Reviewed the Vapor Power 2 in depth and highlighted its HexGrit surface technology as a genuine differentiator against the growing field of full-foam paddles — durable grit that held up across extended drilling and match play without a noticeable drop-off, a detail that mattered enough to earn the paddle a spot on their running Best Pickleball Paddles list.
Independent lab testing — spin RPM, swing weight, and surface roughness across 500+ paddles — clocked the Vapor Power 2 at 2,335 RPM of spin, ahead of direct competitors like the Honolulu J2CR (2,288 RPM) and Bread & Butter Loco (2,273 RPM), while swinging lighter than the entire comparison set.
Named 11SIX24 one of the pickleball brands to watch, crediting Groechel's willingness to discontinue underperforming lines (like an earlier kevlar-faced series) rather than milk a fading trend, and noting that a competing reviewer, Braydon Unsicker of Pickleball Effect, said 11SIX24 was the company he'd personally invest in.
Where the Brand Sits in the 2026 Market
By 2026, independent brand rankings placed 11SIX24 among the strongest all-around value plays in the industry, alongside Selkirk, with premium-tier competitors like JOOLA, Honolulu, Gearbox, and CRBN occupying a different price bracket entirely. For entry-level buyers specifically, the sub-$100 Jelly Bean series was singled out as one of the better beginner options on the market, next to Vatic Pro's Prism Flash.
| Model | Category | Price | Notable Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vapor Power 2 | Hybrid / Power | $209.99 | 2,335 RPM spin, lightest swing weight in its comp set |
| Alpha Pro Power Series | Vapor / Hurache-X / Pegasus | $199.99 | USA Pickleball approved, Gen 3 thermoformed |
| Power Series (Gen 3) | Honeycomb core | $169.99 | USAP-approved value pick |
| Hurache-X Control+ | Elongated / Control | $139.99 | Built for two-handed backhand players |
| Jelly Bean Series | Entry-level, 3 shapes | $99.99 | Ranked a top beginner paddle for 2026 |
05 Pro Validation and Sanctioning Realities
11SIX24 picked up its first sponsored PPA Tour professional, Dekel Bar, who began playing the Vapor Power 2 shortly after its release, with fellow pro Will MacKinnon also adopting the paddle without a formal sponsorship deal. Groechel also secured United Pickleball Association of America (UPA-A) approval for the Power 2 line — a governing body that oversees the PPA Tour and Major League Pickleball — a first for the brand's flagship product.
That approval comes with a tradeoff worth knowing: the Power 2 line is UPA-A approved but not USA Pickleball (USAP) approved, which matters only if a player competes in USAP-sanctioned tournaments specifically. Players in that category need to drop down to the USAP-approved Alpha Pro or Gen 3 Power Series instead. It's a nuance most rec players will never run into, and one that independent reviewers have flagged as the one real caveat on an otherwise strong lineup.
06 Timeline: From Cracked Paddle to Category Player
David Groechel's $220 premium paddle cracks after roughly three months of frequent play. He starts building his own paddles rather than buying another one.
11SIX24 Pickleball officially takes form. Groechel begins selling custom-made paddles out of his 600-square-foot D.C. apartment.
First 100 paddles sell out quickly. The Hurache-X shape — an elongated design with a curved top and extra-long handle — gets the brand early attention from tech-focused paddle communities on Discord.
Groechel leaves his 14-year career at HubSpot to run 11SIX24 full-time. Growth accelerates immediately.
11SIX24 wins multiple Pickleball Studio Paddle of the Year awards, signs PPA Tour pro Dekel Bar, and partners publicly with Howie Mandel.
Launch of the Vapor Power 2 with proprietary HexGrit surface technology, UPA-A approval for the Power 2 line, and independent lab testing crowning it a top spin performer in its price class.
07 Why the Story Actually Matters
Plenty of paddle brands lead with a founder story about loving the sport. What separates 11SIX24's version is that it's explicitly a value-chain story: an operator with a finance degree, a decade and a half of enterprise marketing experience, and two prior exits looked at a $220 paddle that failed in three months and treated it as a solvable operations and materials problem, not just a personal annoyance. Self-funding forced discipline that outside capital often erodes. The result, according to reviewers with no financial stake in the outcome, is a paddle lineup that performs at a premium level while pricing itself in the middle of the market.
Whether that holds as the brand scales past its current size — competing against premium players like JOOLA and CRBN on one side and value brands like Vatic Pro on the other — is the open question for 11SIX24's next chapter. Its answer so far has been consistent: keep shipping paddles that outperform their price tag, and let the reviewers say so.