What to Buy First: Game Tables or Gym Equipment? A Facilities Buyer's Honest Comparison

Every Facility Buyer Faces This Choice

I'm the person who orders everything for a hospitality company with about 350 employees across three properties—roughly $400,000 a year across 12 vendors. If you manage purchasing for a club, hotel, school, or office, you know how this goes: two departments want the same budget.

Operations wants a game room. Facilities wants a gym. When I price both, the first quotes I request are for a cornilleau table tennis table (indoor or outdoor, depending on the space) and a commercial treadmill. The gym package usually gets a Smith machine too—people use it for everything from a Smith machine shoulder press to squats.

So which do you buy first? I've bought both, twice. This is the framework I use now, comparing four things that actually matter once the equipment is installed: cost per hour of use, square footage, setup complexity, and how the equipment survives daily commercial abuse.

The Real Cost Is Per Hour, Not Per Sticker

Sticker price is where every conversation starts, so let's get it out of the way. As of January 2025, a commercial treadmill lands roughly between $3,000 and $6,000. A Smith machine runs about $2,500 to $5,000. An 8-foot pool table with a genuine slate top is $2,000 to $8,000 (which, honestly, is a wide enough range that you should never sign a purchase order without a site appraisal). And a cornilleau outdoor table tennis table usually lands between $1,200 and $2,500. Prices vary by dealer and region, so verify current rates and always ask for delivery and setup quotes before comparing.

But here's what I've learned the hard way: the sticker price is the least honest number in the whole decision. Let me rephrase that—it's the easiest number to get, and the most misleading.

People think expensive equipment costs more because you're paying for a brand name. In commercial settings, the reality is usually the reverse: equipment can charge more because it's built to survive repeated use by people who won't treat it carefully. That's why a cornilleau carries the price it does. The causation runs the other way—durable gear costs more because it's durably made, not because a marketing team inflated it.

I saw this play out with a "value" treadmill I bought for a corporate break room—about $1,800 against $4,200 for the commercial model. Eight months in, the incline motor started grinding. A service call cost $350. Two months later, the belt needed replacing: another $600. By the end of 18 months, I'd spent $2,750 on a machine that was basically worthless, and the room didn't have a working treadmill for much of that time. The $4,200 model would have covered the warranty service and survived the usage.

Here's a calculation I ran after outfitting our second location. The treadmill cost $4,500 installed and gets maybe 2.5 hours of use a day—call it 900 hours per year. Over four years, that's about $1.25 per hour of use, before maintenance. The outdoor cornilleau table cost $2,200 delivered and gets around 5 hours of use a day, so 1,825 hours a year. Over four years, that's about $0.30 per hour. The game table costs less per hour of actual use, with a fraction of the maintenance.

Square Footage: Where the Debate Gets Decided

Fitness equipment eats square footage, and it's single-purpose square footage. A treadmill has a footprint of about 3 by 6 feet, plus at least 3 feet of clearance so nobody catches an elbow. That's roughly 36 square feet of dedicated space. A Smith machine is bigger—about 5 by 7 feet—and between the two you're committing almost 90 square feet of indoor space to two pieces of equipment.

A pool table looks bigger at first glance. An 8-foot table is about 4.3 feet wide by 7.7 feet long, and you need cue clearance on all sides—roughly 3 to 4 feet depending on cue length. In practice, you need a space closer to 12 by 16 feet. So yes, it claims more total area.

But here's what shifts the math: the cornilleau outdoor table tennis table can live outside. If you have a patio, a courtyard, a covered walkway, or a bit of landscaping, the table tennis table uses zero indoor square footage. That's a huge advantage in a commercial building, where indoor space is the most expensive space you have. We put ours under a covered patio next to the pool, and it gets more use than anything inside the gym.

One caveat: even the outdoor table needs some clearance. The playing surface is ITTF regulation size—9 feet by 5 feet, 30 inches high—so leave about 5 feet behind each end for players to move. That's still space you don't have to heat, cool, or clean.

So, on space: if indoor floor area is your bottleneck, buy the outdoor table tennis table first. If you've got a dedicated room, a pool table is a strong social anchor—just measure the room before you commit.

Setup Is Where Bad Purchases Get Exposed

A treadmill arrives, you roll it into place, plug it in, and it's ready. A Smith machine takes longer—pulleys, cables, brackets—but it's still a same-day setup.

A pool table is not a same-day setup. Anyone searching "how to set up pool table" before buying is already ahead of where I was the first time.

The essentials: the floor has to be flat, the frame has to sit level—use shims, don't guess—and the slate has to be checked with a spirit level in both directions before the cloth goes on. If the slate is off by even an eighth of an inch, balls drift on slow shots and players blame the table instead of their aim. Budget for a professional installer and add $250 to $500 to the project. Don't let anyone convince you setup will be handled in-house.

We didn't have a formal installation verification process for equipment deliveries. That cost us when a pool table sat unassembled for two weeks waiting for a technician (a technician we'd booked—just not soon enough), and the cloth had to be re-stretched after he leveled the slate. Should mention: we now require written acceptance after installation.

Looking back, I should have scheduled the installer before the table even shipped. At the time, leaving a gap seemed efficient. It wasn't.

Table tennis is the opposite extreme. A cornilleau arrives mostly assembled: legs fold out, wheels lock, and two people can have it match-ready in about twenty minutes. The outdoor model doesn't need leveling or installation—it sits on any reasonably flat surface. In a commercial setting, that difference matters more than you'd think. Setup friction is the difference between a table in use by Friday and one still in boxes next Monday.

What Actually Breaks (and What Doesn't)

Here's what has actually broken in our facilities across the last two years.

The treadmill's incline motor. The Smith machine's cable on the high pulley. Pool table felt—twice, on a table that gets heavy daily use. Paddles and balls for the table tennis table, which are consumables. Normal.

The cornilleau table itself: zero issues. It's been rained on, left outside through winter, and used by people who have clearly never held a paddle. It still plays straight. There's a reason "ping pong cornilleau" is a common search phrase among facility managers. The French manufacturer built its reputation on outdoor tables that can handle real weather and real use. At least, that's been my experience across three properties.

Compare that with the gym side. Treadmill belts and motors have a finite service life, and in a busy facility, usage can push well over 100 hours a week during peak season. The treadmill incline workout feature is great—right up until the actuator fails and you're waiting eight days for a part. Smith machines need cable lubrication and tension checks periodically. None of this is a reason to skip fitness equipment entirely. It's a reason to budget for maintenance.

My rule now: only buy equipment explicitly rated for commercial use. A residential treadmill in a shared facility will fail. A non-weatherproof table tennis table placed outdoors will warp. A pool table without a slate top will lose its level surface. The commercial-grade version of all three costs more upfront—and costs less to own.

So What Should You Buy?

Here's my honest, scenario-based advice.

Hotel or resort with outdoor space: buy the cornilleau outdoor table tennis table first. It's a guest amenity that actually gets used, it costs less than gym equipment, and it doesn't consume indoor square footage. Add fitness equipment later, in phases.

Corporate office with wellness goals: start with a commercial treadmill if the primary goal is improving health engagement. Buy the commercial-grade model, budget for a service agreement, and add a table tennis table to the break area when the budget opens up. It builds community in ways a treadmill can't.

An empty room and two competing proposals: the pool table wins as a social anchor. A room with a pool table and a table tennis table becomes the default hangout. A room with treadmills and a Smith machine becomes the corner people use for a few months in January.

Tight budget: buy one quality piece instead of three cheap ones. That lesson keeps proving itself. The cheap pool table with a warped frame, the budget treadmill that dies in year one, the indoor table that gets left in the rain—all of them cost more in repairs and complaints than the money saved upfront.

Bottom Line

Both categories belong in a well-rounded facility eventually. The order matters less than the mindset. Look at cost per hour of use, not the sticker. Give setup the respect it deserves. And remember: the cheapest option on the quote sheet is rarely the cheapest option in the operating budget. In my experience, the lowest quote has ended up costing us more about 60% of the time.

Value over price. That framework has never let me down in a budget meeting.