GoodRec Goes International

Lewis Black launched GoodRec in October 2020, in the middle of a pandemic that had shut down exactly the kind of in-person gathering his company was built around. The idea came from his own frustration after moving abroad after graduation: finding a consistent pickup game meant piecing together fragmented Facebook groups and unreliable group texts, with no guarantee the game would have enough players, the right skill mix, or a court that hadn't double-booked. “We wanted a more flexible and instant way to play sports,” Black has said of the decision to build GoodRec with co-founders Midori Koide and Jeff Estes.

The app now works as a marketplace, matching players by location, skill level, availability, and sport, and organized more than 65,000 games in 2025 alone.

GoodRec has now raised $6.4 million, co-led by Bow Capital and Charge Ventures, to fund its first international expansion — into Europe and Australia by the end of 2026.