Candy.com sells for $3M. Here’s what it means.
It’s official, according to seller Rick Schwartz: Candy.com has sold to G&J Holdings for $3 million (and may include some royalties). But I’m not going to write about how great Rick is; I’ll leave that to other people (and Schwartz does such a good job of it himself). Instead, I’m going to make a few observations:
1. I like the online candy sales business, and this is of course the perfect domain name for it. This really came down to a make vs. buy decision for the buyers. They could spend $3 million on branding or buy this domain name. Was it a smart move? Only time will tell. But I sure like the ring of calling up a potential business partner and saying “This is Joe with Candy.com”. Instant credibility.
2. The candy market is huge. Every time I write about a domain dispute involving a candy company I get lots of visitors from various industry publications. I spotted a good domain — CandyShow.com — during the last Moniker auction and picked it up.
3. Like Toys.com before it, this sale will get lots of press and help the domain name aftermarket.
4. Get ready for even more people posting on domain name forums that they have CrappyCandyDomain.com available for sale, and that surely it’s worth 1/1,000 of what Candy.com sold for.
M. Menius says
For a company that plans to be in the candy business on a long term basis, I believe this was a smart investment. It is the ultimate online brand and destination for that industry. The tangible industry & marketing cachet the name provides is something that most of us can only speculate on.
Putting the name to good use should yield rewards like Hotels.com, Homes.com, etc.
wannadevelop.com says
Nice payday at last with some 50x++ ROI
Sahar helped Rick acquire the candy.com domain for a little over $100,000 back in the day’
Congrats to everybody involved that made the deal happen!
Cheers,
Mike
Ralph says
Congrats to Rick… In all honesty I Rick was crazy to pay 100k for that name… Oh well. show’s you how much I know…
Roberto says
I am looking to possibly selling my Tortillas.com domain name – tortillas are a $6 billion a year industry in the US alone and are popular and gaining more popularity around the world.
Kammon says
It all depends on the management team.
It could go 2 ways. One will end up in a bankruptcy like business.com or a great success like chocolate.com
So it depends.
Having the best domain in the world does not guarantee success.
I wish the new candy.com owners, best of luck.
Johnny says
I’ve always wanted to send someone tortillas by mail as a gift. 🙂 Just kidding Roberto.
Truthfully, and I bet Rick knows this, Candy.com probably would have sold for $10 million if he had held onto it for another 10 years, but the human lifespan is only so long….so he was smart to sell.
Francis Simisim says
Wow, finally a great domain sale. But only time will tell how candy.com will do.
bernard says
As a wannabee domainer hoping to be the rick schwartz of tomorrow, I will immediatly start to buy tons of LLLL.com and 3 keywords domains with 0 revenue and additional expenses of minisites to flip like a crazy with greatCandyOnline.com in a few years!
More seriously, it will be interesting to see what will be the market share of candy.com in a few years.