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Shopify Inc. has scooped up a pair of internet domain names from a smaller Canadian e-commerce player for more than $500,000, as it continues to build out an online platform under the “Shop” banner.
EMERGE Commerce Ltd. announced Jan. 6 that it sold the domains Shop.ca and Shop.us to Canada’s largest tech company. The URLs now redirect users to Shopify’s Shop App website, a marketplace for Shopify-hosted retailers marketed as a “digital shopping assistant” where shoppers can search products and brands, make purchases and track shipments.
The sale would put the deal among the top publicly reported all-cash domain name sales so far in 2025, according to figures tracked by domain name sales database NameBio.
According to NameBio, the top five most expensive publicly reported all-cash domain names sold last year were Rocket.com for US$14 million, Gold.com for US$8.5 million, Shift.com for US$1.3 million, TP.com for US$1.2 million and BestOdds.com for US$1.025 million.
The three most expensive publicly reported all-cash domain sales tracked by NameBio dating back to 1999 are Voice.com for US$30 million, Chat.com for US$15.5 million, and NFTs.com for US$15 million.
Toronto-based Emerge owns a portfolio of niche e-commerce brands, including meat and seafood subscription business truLocal, meat-of-the-month subscription service Carnivore Club, discount golf experiences and products company UnderPar, and golf products and apparel retailer JustGolfStuff.
The original Shop.ca emerged in 2011 as a made-in-Canada player in the e-commerce marketplace space, billing itself as “Canada’s largest online shopping destination.” The company filed for bankruptcy in 2016 after running up $72 million in losses. Emerge bought Shop.ca and revived it in 2018 as a destination for content and coupons, featuring shopping guides and coupon codes for major retailers.
Emerge founder and chief executive Ghassan Halazon said in a press release that the Shop.us and Shop.ca domains had been “idle and non-revenue generating in recent years” and were sold to Shopify for “non-dilutive cash proceeds to fund future growth plans.”
The sale of Shop.us and Shop.ca rank fairly high among recent publicly reported domain name sales — but their dot-com counterpart sold for a lot more just over 21 years ago. According to NameBio, Shop.com sold for US$3.5 million in November 2003.
Domain investing can be a lucrative business. According to IBIS World, the U.S. domain name sales industry grew 4.4 per cent to US$9.4 billion in 2024. But it’s also a crowded market — aftermarket exchanges like Sedo and Afternic, which allow people to buy, sell and park domains, currently have millions of domains for sale.