My wife received an email from Seamless Web today announcing that the company has undergone a small but important name change. Instead of SeamlessWeb, the name the company has used since 1999, the company is now known as Seamless, and it is using Seamless.com for its website.
According to Whois records, it appears that Seamless.com was acquired around October of 2010. The domain name had previously been privately registered, but on October 7, the registrant became Ryan Scott. According to a profile on LinkedIn, Ryan Scott is the Vice President of Marketing at Seamless.com.
On its website, the company discusses why it made this smart change:
“When SeamlessWeb was founded in 1999, the dot-com bubble was nearing its peak and the word “web” was on the tip of everyone’s tongues. No wonder we thought it was such a good addition to our name! And with the iPhone and mobile apps many years away, we kind of had a point. The web ruled the day and we made ordering food online a seamless process. Simple enough, right?
Well, times change and technology does too. The days of people accessing the Internet from one computer in one location are long since gone as a plethora of devices from the iPad to smartphones to even televisions have completely changed the way that people interact with the Internet. One thing that hasn’t changed? Consumers always want a seamless and consistent experience, allowing them to enjoy a great service no matter how they access it.
That brings us to where we are today. We make online and mobile food delivery and pickup ordering fun and easy for everyone, everywhere. And the future of ordering is beyond the web, which is something we’ve already seen with our mobile apps (now 14% of all orders and growing fast!) and will continue to see in the coming weeks, months, and years. Recognizing that, we’ve decided to embrace these exciting times and take a cue from how you, our highly valued members, often refer to us: we’re dropping the “web” from our name. Seamless is now the present and the future of food ordering.”
I personally think it is a smart move to re-brand and it was good foresight to acquire the domain name. I am sure there’s an interesting story behind how they were able to buy it, since it had a private registration dating back to 2005. I searched but could not find a sales price disclosed anywhere.
Why did they tell you about their name change?
This is pretty random E, unless you have wrote about them in the past it would appear you are free advertising.
@ Josh
I guess you missed the first sentence… my wife told me about it and she received an email they sent to newsletter subscribers.
I think it’s of interest because they rebranded to the generic term. Would be nice to get some additional insight on how the acquired the Seamless.com name.
I guess you could say its free advertising for anything I write about since I don’t do paid/compensated posts.
@Josh
I also received this email yesterday as a random SeamlessWeb customer- apparently they sent it to everyone (presumably millions and millions of people). Also, Seamless is a major company worth tens or hundreds of millions based in all major US cities; it’s not some small startup.
Great move by them. I always called it “Seamless” anyway, and the one-word rolls off the tongue much better.
Youre right, I missed the “wife” 🙂
Definitely a fantastic decision. This will pay off for them in the long run.