In July of this year, I reported that the WW.com domain name appears to have sold. WW.com previously sold in 2014 for an undisclosed price. Although the Whois record was private and the domain name did not resolve in July, I speculated that Weight Watchers may have acquired the domain name. In addition to the fact that Weight Watchers’ initials are “WW,” the domain name transferred to corporate brand protection registrar SafeNames, where Weight Watchers registers its domain names.
Last week, I updated the article I wrote because WW.com started forwarding to WeightWatchers.com. Although the Whois record remains private, it could be assumed that Weight Watchers acquired the domain name because it wouldn’t make sense for anyone else to forward the domain name.
This morning, it was reported that Weight Watchers is rebranding as WW. According to an article published this morning on CNN Money, “Weight Watchers really wants to let you know that it’s not just a diet company — so much so that it’s changing its name to WW.” Smartly, the company bought the matching WW.com in advance of the rebranding.
Since noticing the changes to WW.com, I periodically reached out to people in the Investor Relations and legal counsel offices at Weight Watchers via phone and email to ask if the publicly traded company acquired WW.com. I did not hear a response from company representatives. My guess is that the company did not respond because it wanted to keep this rebranding as private as possible in advance of the news.
Kudos to Weight Watchers for acquiring WW.com before rebranding. Owning WW.com will surely be helpful to the company in its rebranding effort. Because it is very likely that WW.com was acquired for seven figures, I will continue to check Weight Watchers SEC filings to see if there are any mentions about the price to acquire WW.com.
I understand acquiring WW as being the umbrella brand that includes Weight Watchers, but I don’t understand the “rebrand”. Weight Watchers has goodwill and almost everyone understands what the service/product offers consumers. If they start running commercials for WW, without mentioning Weight Watchers, than it will be confusing to consumers. They need to rethink strategy of “changing name” to WW imo.
Pretty bold move. Weight Watchers probably wants to expand its product line and no longer wants to be just a diet company. As far as I can see they also bought WW.co.uk and WW.de. That will certainly shine a light on 2-letter .com’s. Lucky if you own one or at best – more than one. 🙂
They also got WW.fr and WW.nl
Weight Watchers are transitioning into a health & wellness brand. The core philosophy has changed in that aspect, and the business intends to build a holistic goal approach rather than looking at the weight scales alone, seemingly because this fad had peaked and the business had been going downhill for a few years before changing direction. KFC did similar when it moved from the name Kentucky Fried Chicken to KFC.
WW is a confusing name on the internets.
– W W DOT COM!
– Yeah, I got W W W and COM, but whats the domain name?
Google is on a mission to remove www from the web, starting with the Chrome browser… The new generation won’t be missing www