What 500 Basketball Parents Have To Say About Basketball Player Training Preferences

Recently, we surveyed over 500 basketball parents to gather opinions on optimal training preferences, how much they spend on basketball equipment, coaching styles, and more! 

We hope this serves as a helpful resource, providing insights into how much the “average” basketball parent is spending on their child and what might be a reasonable investment based on your financial situation. While this is not a recommendation, it offers a glimpse into what others are doing.

There are many ways for your child to improve, specifically in the summer when off-season training is at its peak. We asked the question, “How do you support your child's skill development outside of organized team practices?”

Here are the responses:

Interesting enough, the last time we asked this question to parents, the #1 answer was camps and clinics. However, in 2024, the #1 answer was actually at-home training at 87%! And this makes sense, as schedules tend to get busier during the summer with vacations, AAU or other prep leagues, summer sports, etc. a hooper’s time at home becomes even more valuable.

This is often what sets the good hoopers, and the great ones apart - being able to develop their skill outside of organized practice. And our Dr. Dish Home product is the perfect training partner to be your partner.

A lesser answer that didn’t make the top 6 was seeking out a personal trainer, which came in at about 54% of this group. In-case you’re wondering how much personal trainer rates are: 

• 1 on 1 training on average is $100-$150 / session. 
• Small group (2-4 kids) on average costs $30-$50 / session
• Large Group Training (4+ kids) on average costs $25-$40 / session 

If you do the math, this can easily add up to thousands of dollars a year depending on how frequently your hooper is participating in these sessions. Below is the actual breakdown of how much these 500 parents spend on their hooper annually:

As you can see, the majority of parents (82%) are spending anywhere from $600 to $6,000 dollars a year on training. These numbers might be surprising if you’ve never seen them before.

Our Dr. Dish Home and IC3 Shot Trainer are great one-time investments that completely cover a year (or less!) of training expenses - and will last way beyond that in terms of the value you are getting out of them! 

We like to compare this to renting or leasing a car. If you lease a car, you pay a monthly fee to use the car. It fulfills an important purpose, but you do not own the car and have to give it back once the lease is over. Similar to training, if you pay for a trainer every session, they bring great value to the player but the cost just accumulates, because you could never "own" the trainer. There are additional costs that aren't accounted for as well, like driving mileage and time to meet them.

Why a shooting machine you may ask?

The #1 thing parents prioritize in their child’s training regiment - Shooting. It is the most valuable skill a high-level basketball player can have.Player's with a high shooting percentage are bound to not only get more playing time, but have a shot to play at the next level (collegiate or professional) of basketball.

Dr. Dish has helped countless athletes get to the next level through consistency and hard work with our machines. All of this is important - but having fun and getting better are always our main goals when it comes to our innovation.

One of the main things that always tends to be an issue when training at home? Tracking progress towards your hooper getting better:

Dr. Dish not only tracks your stats through our Advanced Analytics, but also pairs this with goal setting - to see your progress towards reaching your highest potential. This is just scratching the surface of the fun, reps, and motivation the Dr. Dish provides. 

There was so much great info that parents shared with us throughout this entire survey. We hope these visuals and data help you make the best decisions for your family's training needs.

Whatever level your hooper may be at - there are great solutions out there to help them progress and reach their goals, whether that’s to make it to the pros, or just to have fun!

If you want more info on our Home training solutions - click the button below or give us an email to home@drdishbasketball.com