Looks Like Walmart Paid $9 Million for Shoes.com + IP

Shoes.com LogoIt has been reported that Walmart acquired the Shoes.com domain name and has plans to utilize the domain name as an independent brand. What  I haven’t seen reported anywhere is the price Walmart paid to acquired Shoes.com.

This afternoon, George Kirikos helped me uncover what appears to be the sale price that Walmart paid to acquire the Shoes.com domain name, associated domain names, and related intellectual property. According to a pdf of a court filing I found on the Alvarez & Marsal website, Walmart bid $9 million for the “Shoes.com Technologies domain names and intellectual property.”

George Kirikos compiled several associated filings on his website. As George wrote, “After reading the above, one can see Walmart paid USD $9 million for the shoes.com domain name, plus minor related assets (social media accounts, lower quality domain names, and some trademark registrations.”

This deal includes more than just the Shoes.com domain name. The other assets included in the sale are likely much less valuable, but I don’t think it can be recorded as a pure domain name sale.

It is great to see a company like Walmart operating a descriptive keyword domain name like Shoes.com. It will be interesting to see how Walmart grows this brand and how much marketing Walmart puts behind the brand.

Thanks to George for his help in uncovering what appears to be the price Walmart paid for Shoes.com and associated IP.

Elliot Silver
Elliot Silver
About The Author: Elliot Silver is an Internet entrepreneur and publisher of DomainInvesting.com. Elliot is also the founder and President of Top Notch Domains, LLC, a company that has closed eight figures in deals. Please read the DomainInvesting.com Terms of Use page for additional information about the publisher, website comment policy, disclosures, and conflicts of interest. Reach out to Elliot: Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn

20 COMMENTS

  1. Based on the very low value of the other domain names, TMs, and social media accounts, I’d consider this a $9 million domain name deal. The rest of the assets were inconsequential, but Wal-Mart was forced to buy them to get the domain name.

  2. Just for some additional details, before I even got to the BC Court Services online, I went to PACER, and then to the US bankruptcy receiver’s website at;

    http://inverness.us/receivership-shoes-com-onlineshoes-com

    (there’s a separate US bankruptcy) That eventually inspired me to look to the Canadian bankruptcy records ($12, but worth it), to find the details.

    By the way, there was a note about a licensing deal for the Shoes.com domain name between the US company and the Canadian owner. The receiver records and the PACER documents confirm that that licensing deal was terminated, when the US bankruptcy assets were sold.

    So, Walmart gains the domain “cleanly” now, without any other side agreements, etc.

  3. Wal-Mart is going on an all out war against Amazon for the online retail space. Amazon owns Zappos.com. The $9 million price tag is peanuts for WM and I hope they promote this brand aggressively.

  4. Marc Lore of Jet.com/Walmart (and Quidsi before that) certainly knows the value of domain names, given Quidsi owned Diapers.com, Soap.com and other domain names before being bought by Amazon years ago. Now he’s using the same playbook at Walmart.

    Strangely, Amazon just killed Quidsi!

  5. Not strange they killed Quidsi. They bought it for that one reason – to kill it, to take the competition out. Job well done. Now Lore is trying again with a system that worked for him and a new partner in crime.

    • I agree, and that’s a good point. If Amazon wants to kill off the Quidsi-type of business model, why not just buy Shoes.com outright and kill it themselves rather than let Walmart snatch it up?

      • Why would Walmart sell Shoes.com after buying it?

        If you meant why didn’t Amazon buy it before Walmart bought it, perhaps they bid less or didn’t outbid Walmart. I have no idea if there were other bids though.

      • Paragraph 3.2(f) on page 5 of the Alvarez & Marsal PDF (Receiver’s Report) states there were 11 offers submitted for the Shoes.com domain name.

        That information is also in paragraph 14(f) of the March 27, 2017 PDF (first PDF) from the court documents linked to above.

      • Yes, before. I wonder if there’s a way to find out who the other 10 or 11 bidders were, and if Amazon was one of them…

  6. In order to beat Amazon, amongst other things, you need to double/triple/quadruple serve different recognizable brands in search. Exact match .coms are instant, separate brands.

    That’s how I beat Amazon in selling licensed sports product online.

  7. Great strategy in the part of Wal-Mart to compete against Amazon’s Zappos and the other big players in the U.S. Market.

    They, now, also have the opportunity to secure the Mexican Market … We’re Looking for a Domain Broker to offer Zapatos.mx and Zapatos.com.mx to http://Walmart.com.mx (Zapatos is Shoes in Spanish and .mx and .com.mx are the ccTLDs of Mexico).

  8. The Walmart vs. Amazon competition has turned into an epic battle. At first brick-n-mortar vs. online, but now they are both morphing into something new with the online component taking the greater share. I hate to see local stores disappear, but the economics have clearly dictated this new direction.

    • Perhaps, but this is a capitalist country and small business needs to adapt. Got to be more savvy. These goliaths can be slayed by wise, long term, niche marketing in certain categories.

      Amazon most often delivers the best price but doesn’t necessarily deliver the best overall value/info/new product info over the long term for a real enthusiast.

      It takes passion in any business to win. Amazon has low prices, great delivery time, but very little passion.

      Unfortunately I believe this new generation believes everything should be handed to them and don’t know the old school generations of hustle and hard work.

  9. Funny enough ShoeMe was the owner of shoes.com, If you are the one who bought shoes.me 6 years ago for $1K, I think you have some equity in that, only you know the offers that have, or have not rolled in.

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