I was reading TechCrunch this morning, when I saw the article about the launch of Soap.com, a new website owned and operated by Quidsi, the company that owns and operates Diapers.com. According to the article, the company plans for Soap.com to “offer more than 40,000 products by the end of 2010 and more than 100,000 by the end of 2011.” These plans are clearly ambitious, but the company CEO has said Diapers.com revenue is over $300 million annually (video of that below), so it is very plausible this will happen.
While reading the article, I couldn’t help but think of another company that is taking a similar path with great generic domain names. PetsUnited, LLC owns and operates websites on domain names such as Dog.com, Horse.com, Fish.com, Garden.com, Bird.com, Ferret.com, and other great generic domain names (including a couple recent purchases from my company). The company was founded by Oncologist (yes, Doctor) Alex Tabibi, and in 2006, it reported $62.4 million in revenue according to an Inc. Magazine profile.
Marketers often talk about the importance of building a single brand, and in the case of Quidsi and PetsUnited, LLC, the companies are focusing on building multiple brands while using generic domain names. I will be posting an interview with Alex sometime in the near future, and hopefully he will discuss the challenges and benefits of this. Both Alex and his brother Carlo operate the company, and I am sure working with poses some unique challenges and benefits for the company as well.
Great post Elliot. Would be great to know the actual start-up costs of Diapers.com.
Wow, $300 million? Good for them.