Google announced a couple of weeks ago a very neat product search option, supported by participating retailers like Best Buy, Sears, Williams-Sonoma, Pottery Barn or West Elm. All you have to do is look for the blue dots in the search results to see if the product you’re looking for is available in a local store.
Once you spot a blue dot, you can tap on the “In Stock nearby” link close to it and you’ll be sent to the seller’s page. Here you’ll find out if the item is in stock or if it’s available in a limited amount. The same search mechanism will show how far the stores are from you, but only if you have the My Location option enabled.
Palm webOS, Android and iPhone users that reside in the US will simply need to visit Google.com in their mobile browsers and tap the “more” link, selecting “Shopping” afterwards for this service. Another way of doing this is to check out the “Shopping results” section in the Universal Search results.
