The Tennis Industry Association is asking its members for ideas on how to keep  interest and participation in the sport growing, and its strategy for doing so might be worth checking out.

This week, the group is hosting the TIA Discovery Challenge, a digital event that relies on a stimulation of creative thinking using the “Idea Rally” method. What’s an Idea Rally, you ask? It’s a way to source input from hundreds of experts in a sprint of a few days. Run by the firm IdeaConnection, the event uses peer review of ideas and facilitated discussion to give direction to the brainstorming, so that ideas with the most potential can be identified and explored in depth.

“Over the course of the Idea Rally, hundreds of these experts put their minds together to focus on your problem, and to help give you new avenues of investigation,” IdeaConnection explains on its website.

Those who take part receive rewards, not just for having successful ideas, but for simply taking part.

TIA’s Idea Rally began July 22 and concludes August 1. Participants have been asked for for ideas in five categories: on-court activities and programming; marketing and promotions; technology solutions; wellness and fitness; and “outside-the-box” ideas. The goal in all categories is to increase both the reach of and participation in the sport.

“Whether you’re involved in tennis directly or indirectly, or in sports, marketing, health and wellness—or many other disciplines—the Idea Rally is designed to help us work together to come up with ideas and solutions to how we can get tennis on the road to growth,” TIA said in a news release.

The strategy lends itself to a fast turnaround: Results from the event will be shared at the TIA Tennis Forum in New York on August 26.

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