Media Options Brokers Sale of Gorillas.com

In September, I noticed that Gorillas.com had a Media Options landing page with a $500,000 asking price. What was interesting to me is that Gorillas.com has been owned by NameFind, the domain name portfolio company owned and operated by GoDaddy. I shared what I noticed on Twitter:

Looks like @MediaOptions is brokering the generic and high value https://t.co/LntjHfL7nx domain name on behalf of NameFind (GoDaddy). https://t.co/yliYYMCXvp

— Elliot Silver (@DInvesting) September 23, 2021

Paul Nicks, GoDaddy VP and GM of its Aftermarket, responded to share that Media Options was doing outbound brokering for some of NameFind’s domain names:

Hey, wanted to hop in here quick. We are using MO to do some outbound brokerage for select namefind names, as we’re always experimenting and trying new things. As for our own brokers, we don’t have an outbound team, only inbound so there is zero overlap.

— Paul Nicks (@PaulENicks) September 24, 2021

This morning, my DomainTools Domain Monitor alert email showed the status of Gorillas.com had changed. The domain name was unlocked and is now in “ok” status, indicating that it may be pending transfer. In addition, the domain name moved from NameFind’s account to the Afternic escrow account indicating that it sold.

I reached out to Paul Nicks, and he confirmed that the domain name was sold. In addition, he confirmed that Media Options did the outbound work to get the deal done. Unfortunately, he would not share the sale price due to company policy about that.

It remains to be seen who acquired Gorillas.com, but I would be surprised if it is not the German grocery delivery startup called Gorillas that just raised $950M in funding at a valuation of $3B. That company currently uses Gorillas.io for its website. Once the transfer finalizes we will see who got it.