Morning Folks!!
Yesterday I posted a story of the top 25 all time reported domain sales. Candy.com made that list tied for #8. But what makes my sale different than most of the others is that mine will continue to increase in ranking as I get royalties and other considerations. Matter of fact I will announce here that I have now exercised my option to buy another 2.5% of Candy.com just yesterday. That brings my holdings to 10%. So this book is still being written. This sale is still living and breathing and if/when someday Candy.com ends somewhere else, I get a piece of that sale as well.
How was I able to carve out something like this? Because of a shared vision and the vessel needed to get there. Pretty simple. A formula that was carved out of circumstance. The answer is always yes when you make a deal instead of no. But when you get a yes, that creates a circumstance to get some consideration. Now you can't do this all the time.It depends on the circumstance. Most of the time it is settled with money. With a dollar figure. But beyond that playing field there are a number of other playing fields that are created. Since those have been created and since nobody has more information then the 2 parties negotiating, that deal that is the ultimate 'Inside Information'. True knowledge. Confidence. Passion and all the rest.
Depending on the terms of the 7 higher reported sales than Candy.com, if they were straight cash deals, then I see candy.com eventually being much higher on that list. Since it was tied for 8th place with my very good friend, Roy Messer, I hate to tell him he is now in sole possession of 9th place. Of course that may depend on the amount of vodka supply he is getting for selling Vodka.com.
Some see a domain and see a sale. I see a domain and an entire world of options and possibilities that opens up. The limit is your mind and creative sense in both content and business outlook. My job is not to find 1 million people that see what I see. My mission is to find one. Find one for each domain that lends itself to be included in the final landscape of the Internet. That is worthy of Main Street. That is sensitive to the needs of who they are serving.
Look, some folks are in the cattle business and their job is to load up the truck and take those cattle to market. They are looked at by the herd. By dozens at at time. They are nameless. That is different than the family cow named 'Suzy'. Suzy the one that gives you milk and butter and cheese and you have decided to use for a lifetime. She may or may not end up on that truck. Chances are she won't. The table, maybe. ;-)
But now that you are shocked, take a moment to consider the difference. Consider the parallel. Consider things missing even if they are not easily visible or not that pleasant to think of. Consider the short term gain for the many years of satisfaction and production. Consider the value is still there either way but one pays great dividends along the journey and you can still have it end up on the truck. It still has value. But you tapped into something else. Something greaterthan just the norm.
If you want the best, then you usually have to overpay to get it. I have said it many times over the years. I would rather overpay for gold than get a bargain on worthless shit. And when you do it right, what you overpay for today becomes a huge bargain in the years ahead. That is the true measure of a deal. Not 10 minutes, 10 hours or 10 months later but 10 YEARS later. And when you measure by the generation and have a relaxed time frame you can do great things and put great deals together. But if you only see one playing field...........
Merry Christmas!!
Have a GREAT Day!
Rick Schwartz
KA
That’s a great post Rick, thank for sharing.
Donny
Rick – You did an awesome job on candy.com, and the ability to buy additional shares in the company was a great idea.
Congrats!
Anunt
“it’s far better to buy a wonderful company at a fair price than a fair company at a wonderful price” – Warren Buffett
owen
Sweet
MarkH
Happy Holidays Rick.
UFO
Excellent negotiation, have to admit you only need to look at your sales column to know you’ve got better deals than most of us would have got.
RAYY
Happy Christmas Rick.
domain guy
sophiscated investment strategy revealed…up to 10% signficant if it were a public company you would now have disclose your interest.
also relevent is that every major candy company passed and a small company that wanted to gain a competitive advatage cut the deal.
incest cash to gain an ongoing percentage.
so….domain king …..how much to gain the 10%? you may be restricted by a nda..your business model also has established that domains are a sophiscated long term investement…possibly eligable for ira accounts?
rick you are a an entreprenur above approach with industry leading edge knowledge.unreal…great work rick!!
Anunt
Rick, what were your intentions when buying the domain name Candy.com
I bet u were thinking…WebCam Girl named”Candy” for Sex Chat site…
And ended up selling it to an actual candy maker…lol
AHEAD OF TIME
Domaining world is going to boom with these new gTLDs and 2020 experts predict 50 billion devices worldwide.
http://m.itproportal.com/2012/12/20/great-internet-population-boom-looking-next-trillion-connections/
Not My First Rodeo
@Ahead of Time: Nah, gtld’s aren’t going anywhere. If anything, they are on the expressway to failure.
AHEAD OF TIME
@Not My First Rodeo: I was talking about the gTLDs type in traffic to .com
so I agree 100%
This is the way I look at gTLDs imagine train map and .com is the capital city
now all these gTLDs are new train lines going to point .com!! It’s simple MORE
TRAFFIC, MORE LEADS, MORE SALES
Merry Christmas
Altaf
Hi Rick,
Wish you & the folks here and the families Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!!
Gratefully,
Altaf
ScottM
Having a little trouble understanding why the domain sale of GiftCard.com in September for $4 million, also with stock equity for the seller same as with Rick in Candy.com, cannot be included on DNJournal’s list of top 25? The sale of GiftCard.com was widely reported including by Michael on TheDomains.com and on CNBC website.
Candy.com has been penalized by Google - Robbie's Blog
[…] For those of you who don’t know Candy.com was sold by “Domain King” Rick Schwartz for $3 million dollars plus royalties and % of shares with the options to increase over time back this was back in 2009 and currently on Ricks Blog in 2013 the sale is listed as also having 10% ownership and I am unsure if this 10% ownership of the domain name or the whole company – You can read Rick’s post from back in 2012 when he discusses it here. […]
Candy.com has been penalized by Google | SALEDOM.COM
[…] For those of you who don’t know Candy.com was sold by “Domain King” Rick Schwartz for $3 million dollars plus royalties and % of shares with the options to increase over time back this was back in 2009 and currently on Ricks Blog in 2013 the sale is listed as also having 10% ownership and I am unsure if this 10% ownership of the domain name or the whole company – You can read Rick’s post from back in 2012 when he discusses it here. […]