Paintball Industry Overview

International

Paintball has had explosive growth over the last fifteen years. It is now played in over 140 countries. It is a common casual sport worldwide and is also played professionally, with prizes in some areas as high as $100,000. The participation rate in paint ball has increased 29.6% from 1998 to 2001, and frequent participation (15+ days a year) has increased by 78% in the same 3 year period. Even though those stats are older, the trend in growth continues to this day. This means that the sport is enjoyed by a great many amount of people; some of them are quite casual about it, while for some people, the hobby borders on obsession. 

National

The paintball industry is pretty much the same in Canada as it is in the United States, so excuse the use of stats from the U.S. That being said there are approximately 2,000 paintball stores, and 1,400 paintball fields in the U.S. and the ratio of fields to population is about the same in Canada. So it’s quite obvious to see that in North America, paintball is a very popular sport. A rough estimate places the number of players in the U.S. at approximately six million.

Regional

In eastern Canada paintball is home to a great many paintball fields, with major fields existing in PEI, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia, as well as many smaller fields. There are many tournaments held in each province, and some of the teams from eastern Canada have even won world championships.

Provincial/Local

In PEI, there is one major paintball field established, and three or four smaller fields. The fields are located in various areas on the island, and are not close enough to compete with each other to for market share.

The local area of Charlottetown is home to the major paintball facility on the island. Spikes Paintball is that facility, and is home to a world champion team. This is the only paintball field in the local area, but presents significant competition for Splat Paintball