The domain name Flying.com was sold via NameMedia (BuyDomains) in September 2009 and at the time the price was not disclosed. Yesterday a press release revealed the price paid and it was $845,000 USD. The buyer(s) at that time wanted to remain unknown.
Since the sale price is now public, Flying.com domain name sale ranks at the # 9 spot for the highest reported domain name sales for 2009 according to DnJournal.com’s charts.
2009 Top Ten Domain Name Sales:
- Toys.com $5.1M
- Candy.com $3M
- Fly.com $1.76M
- Auction.com $1.7M
- Ticket.com $1.525M
- Russia.com $1.5M
- Call.com $1.1M
- Webcam.com $1.02M
- Flying.com $845K
- Server.com $770K
Although the press release wasn’t 100% clear, but UsedAirplanes.com purchased Flying.com for $1.1 Million from the 2009 investors. The reason it was not clear, because the buyers in 2009 to the buyers in 2010 were not known. UsedAirplanes.com has reportedly been trying to purchase Flying.com from the time it sold in 2009 to the private investors.
Since this is the first reported $1 Million + sale of 2010…. Flying.com takes over the number one reported domain name sale currently for 2010 beating out Poker.org which sold for $1 Million. According to the press release, Flying.com’s first beta version will be launched June 1, 2010 but there is currently some inventory on the site already.
UsedAirplanes.com will utilize the generic domain name Flying.com to also display the inventory of used airplanes they offer while also setting up brokerage system for selling planes.
Mark Horne, president of UsedAirplanes Inc. sure seems to know domain names are important! “Owning a domain name of this caliber will allow us to expand our talents deeper in the aviation business and build upon the success of UsedAirplanes.com. The word “flying” is known and understood by virtually every person and the word is used in every area within the aviation industry. In addition, Google, Yahoo and Bing process approximately 20 million search queries for the word "flying” every month,” stated Mark J Horne, President & CEO of UsedAirplanes, Inc.
Is this the last purchase for UsedAirplanes Inc,? It appears not! The press release states near the end that they are "currently looking to acquire other digital media companies and websites"
The air industry for domain names has been pretty hot since at least last year as several flying related domain names have sold. The largest of those was Fly.com at $1.7 Million. Pilot.com sold last week for $300K but likely will not be developed as of right now to aviation, since the buyer was the publication company Hearst. Jets.com also sold for $375,000 in September of 2009 to Concord Jets for rebranding.
You can read more for the companies press release about the Flying.com domain name purchase and their plans for the domain name here.
