Delivery service decided .co was better than a longer .com domain name.
College campus delivery service Parachute recently acquired the domain name Parachute.co. In our continuing series on end user domain name purchase stories, Parachute co-founder Zev Lapin explains why his company selected Parachute.co and how it bought it.
DNW: What is Parachute?
Parachute (formerly CourseLoads) is a last mile delivery layer within college campuses. We make it simple for students to get what they need, delivered directly to their dorm room; starting with laundry, snacks, and essentials. While most delivery services such as Seamless, UPS, or local pizza shops are prevented from entering dorms due to the required security clearance, Parachute hires ambitious students who already have the necessary clearance to deliver the things their peers need.
DNW: You originally used the domain name GetParachute.com, correct? Why did you choose this domain name? Did you look into acquiring Parachute.com?
We recently decided to rebrand from CourseLoads (our initial name) to Parachute. The .com, .net, and .co TLDs were all taken but not being used, so we thought there was a good chance we could purchase one of those domains from their current owner. While considering next steps in negotiating a purchase of either parachute.com or parachute.co (our two top choices), we decided we needed a backup and quickly settled on GetParachute.com which was available as a new domain. We launched with GetParachute.com, while negotiating behind the scenes for the .co domain. Unfortunately, the owner of Parachute.com was not interested in even entertaining an offer for the domain, so we put all of our effort into obtaining the Parachute.co. The negotiation process took about three weeks via Sedo, and we were happy with the final purchase price (low four figures).
DNW: You just acquired Parachute.co, and now forward GetParachute.com to Parachute.co. Why the switch?
Our name is Parachute, so ideally a good business domain doesn’t have any extraneous words as that dilutes the strength of the brand. Many startups add a “get” to the name to create a domain when an ideal version is unavailable, but in my opinion there are more and more TLDs that are becoming common and accepted by a mainstream audience. We’d much rather have just our brand name in the TLD and using a .co versus a diluted brand with a .com.
DNW: What was the acquisition process like acquiring Parachute.co? Did it take a long time? What do you think about the price?
The whole process took about three weeks from first offer to closing. The owner was parking the page via Sedo with an option to submit an offer. There were about 15 back and forth offers between us and the seller, but ultimately, we were happy with the final price. We truly believe the domain is going to be a key component to building a strong brand. I don’t agree that you need to own a .com, but you do need a brandable, easy-to-remember, and searchable domain, which I believe we now have.
Andrew, what he said… what you wrote..
he said: Unfortunately, the owner of Parachute.com was not interested in even entertaining an offer for the domain, so we put all of our effort into obtaining the Parachute.co.
you wrote: “Delivery service decided .co was better than a longer .com domain name.”
Keyword being “longer” – meaning they opted for a shorter .co because there initial .com was longer than it needed to be.
I’m comparing GetParachute.com to Parachute.co. He would have preferred Parachute.com, which has the same SLD length, but could not acquire it.
Andew, you are running a wonderful blog. I am addicted to your weekly listings of end user purchases.
I am sorry if I misunderstood your sentence.
I would register for $10 Parachute.tel and redirect it to my original site with a long name. Simple, quick and VERY INEXPENSIVE
First of all this story reads as if they even had a choice, or are not some LOW LEVEL scrubs who cannot afford the .com.
If the dot com of your brand is taken, then you need to rebrand.
These guys will never be parachute, because the owner of parachute would not entertain their offer. And most likely these 2 college kiddies lied in their story and probably could not afford to make a real offer for the .com
They are poor scrubs not deserving of any attention, and here you are defaming dot com on a domain blog, it makes me sick Andy GFY.
So I guess ABC (formerly Google Inc.) should rebrand since ABC.com was taken? You’re an idiot. Dot comes are more overrated than ever today.
They’ll probably rebrand eventually.
Doubt it.
Yep everyone has been saying “Let me just ABC that” instead of “Google it”. Traffic to Google.com has tanked and everyone is going to abc.xyz now, haven’t you heard????
The point is they didn’t give a crap about the .com, and chose .xyz of all TLDs – if that’s not a signal I don’t know what is.
They’re a multi-billion dollar company with resources galore.
The signal I read is that they DGAF about domains. . . but if you are a domainer and have been “playing along” you’d have know this for a long time.
what is a Dot comes? I think you wanted to say DotComs
They’ve moved from one bad domain to another and they’ll be “looking at their options” for years to come. A more logical option would have been choosing a term that is buyable in .com before rebranding.
Man many of these commentors are a bunch of pathetic gits! The buyer should have done this should have done that…. Give it a break u mindless trendy libtards and get a grip!!
.co is can great extension and the choice to use such an extension is very reasonable considering the com was unavailable.
Stuck in yesteryear is what they are, pr .com they would have been saying .coms will never take of because ip addresses are used by everyone
Please tell us all about the incredible businesses that were launched and grew to be consumer brands on .mobi or how about .biz or .info or .us ?
Every business has a million choices now…. just like a brick and mortar business can set up in main street Bismarck, North Dakota or Times Square.
Snoopy is right. Just pick another name that you can buy in .com or fight the marketing battle the rest of your company existence.
Sure. Box launched under box.net for three years before buying the .com and eventually going public. CriagsList.org is another that STILL uses the .org TLD instead of a .com. They’ll probably buy .com when they can afford an offer the owner can’t refuse. For now, I think there new domain definitely works well.
.net and .org are not the examples I requested but that’s cool that you mention them. The poster I was replying to mentions “being stuck in yesteryear” and you chose 2 examples using legacy gTLDs to prove your point. Strange
I think you prove the point that others are making as well : the other options are all second-best options.
This company isn’t starting with a .co or .org or .whatever. They’re growing and they’ve changed their name once before this already.
If you change your name, don’t take a step backwards by picking a secondary gTLD option.
Re; the comment about Craigslist.org. They have owned the dot com for some years. If you type in the dot com, you are forwarded to the dot org.
It’s a pity they couldn’t get parachute.com or maybe they are not ready to pay the price since they paid “low four figures” for parachute.co
Ridiculing kids who do rich kids’ laundry as naff because they don’t have the intuitive million-dollar dotcom? Fan yourselves to quietude, Cake Eaters. It’s sad already.
Who doesn’t know that you can’t brand like this? Because 1) people have anxiety about giving a non-dotcom their credit card data, because the company hasn’t put anything on the line and looks like two guys invoicing on coffee shop wifi, because 2) when people hit a dead end at Parachute.com, they’ll have to slog around Google through the hundreds of other ‘parachute’ mark users, because 3) it only takes a couple news stories about people getting identity theft at .co mockups to devalue your brand, because 4) whatever success you attain can be bled off by anyone operating in a non-competing field at Parachute.com (and hopefully they’re less interesting than…laundry)….etcetera forever.
If you’re not going to grow, if you’re just going to kick around and cover your rent, road-testing a business model for some watchful giant, then using a dictionary word at a .co is nothing to lose sleep about.
But, if they had just used “a coined word in the dot-com,” it would have been just as cheap, but easy to tm and protect, easy to use in different regions, easier to brand and market, easier to present as a well-funded and safe corporate service, easier to grow, easier to build goodwill towards an acquisition…
Dress for the job you want to have.