In the Sedo sales roundup, I take a look back at five domain names that sold at domain marketplace Sedo within the past month. In this edition, I’m covering five sales from October to explore who may have acquired the names and why.
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Laced.com – $250,000
Past tense domains very rarely (publicly) sell for six-figure fees. The sale of Laced.com joins Unchained.com ($174,999) as selling for a six-figure fee this year. NameBio shows that before this year, the last $100,000+ sale ending in “ed” happened in 2017 when Hatred.com sold for $150,000.
Who, then, paid $250,000 to acquire Laced.com? I believe the domain may have been acquired by a British company named Laced. Founded in 2018, Laced is a sneaker marketplace selling authentic, trendy brands such as Air Jordan, Yeezy, and Travis Scott.
While the company is based in the UK, it has a worldwide client base. This may make its Laced.co.uk domain name somewhat obsolete.
Laced.com is currently registered under WHOIS privacy protection at GoDaddy, which means I can’t be sure that the company bought the domain. However, Laced does own LacedHQ.com which is also registered at GoDaddy. This alone isn’t enough to confirm that Laced acquired Laced.com, but the company fits the bill as the most likely buyer.
Topp.com – $55,137
Brandable four-letter .com domains can make good investments and can sell for sizable sums. The sale of Topp.com for $55,137 is a prime example.
Topp.com was acquired by Topp Holdings, a German company focusing on the business services sector. Topp Holdings is named for the Topp family that owns the company.
Topp Holdings is no small company. It’s an international business with 5,600 employees working across ten core brands in seven different countries. A $55,137 domain purchase may be considered small fry, then.
This was a direct upgrade from ToppHoldings.com and while the company hasn’t put Topp.com to use as of writing, it’s likely the company will transition from ToppHoldings.com to Topp.com.
Trave.com – $38,000
Trave is a little-known English word defined as “a frame to confine an unruly horse or ox for shoeing.” I would consider this to be a brandable domain. It was acquired by Traveloka, an Indonesian technology company offering services in the travel industry. Think of it as a Trivago or Expedia for southern Asia.
There’s no immediate reason that I can see as to why Traveloka acquired Trave.com, aside from wondering whether a rebrand might be in the pipeline. If Traveloka is looking to expand internationally, the current name may not “travel” well. Shortening to Trave may work better internationally.
Alternatively, it could be a defensive purchase.
MetaFB.net – $30,000
There has been a frenzy around “meta” keyword domain registrations and acquisitions amid the hype surrounding Facebook’s rebranding to Meta. While Meta already owns Meta.com, the company has been busy acquiring “meta” related domains. Meta was the likely buyer in the $149,000 Meta.so deal and via various law firms, has almost certainly acquired more.
This is an instance where the company’s lawyers paid a $30,000 premium for a name containing both “meta” and “FB,” the common initialism for Facebook.
WHOIS shows the domain is registered to Perkins Coie, LLP, an international law firm that works for Facebook, tasked with “Internet Enforcement.” The seller of this name, who registered it only a month before selling, may have got extremely lucky with this sale. In some circumstances, a registration like this could result in UDRP action.
O-Office.de – $29,105
Sedo, with its heavy presence in Germany, has always performed well when it comes to .de domain names. In fact, 14 of the top 20 .de domain sales of all time are attributed to Sedo. The latest sale of O-office.de is intriguing, though.
On the face of it, you’d be forgiven for thinking that O-office.de may be valued at no more than its registration fee. However, hyphens are commonplace in German domains, and one company at least thought O-office.de was valuable enough to spend $29,105 on it.
That company is Otto Office, a German office supplies company that operates on Otto-Office.com. It operates in Belgium and Germany, all under the Otto-Office.com domain. It already owns the likes of Otto-Office.de and O-Office.com. This looks to have been a defensive acquisition.
Curiously, O-office.be, using the ccTLD for Belgium, was registered on October 26th 2021, just days after the sale of O-office.de was announced. The name is up for sale for $25,000 – highly opportunistic.
Short past tense domains like Wired.com make great consumer facing brands. Laced.com for $250K would be a great upgrade for the ecommerce shoe store. As the price for one-word domains continue to skyrocket, I expect many more coming six-figure sales of short .com domains ending in “ed”, “able”, “ing”, etc.