Google has announced that a service that was previewed last December is now live for mobile devices. I’ll call it the “Blue Dot of Availability” which is stupid but it’s the best I can do. This function is just more evidence that Google is making mobile a top priority and it is giving retailers the ability to come along for the ride.

The Google Mobile blog tells us more

We’re happy to announce that as of today, if you’re searching for a product that is sold by participating retailers, including Best Buy, Sears, Williams-Sonoma, Pottery Barn, or West Elm, you can just look for the blue dots in the search results to see if it’s available in a local store. If you see a blue dot, you can tap on the adjacent “In stock nearby” link, and you’ll be taken to the seller’s page where you’ll see whether the item is “In Stock” or has “Limited Availability” near you. You’ll also see how far away the stores are from you — as long as you’ve enabled My Location or manually specified your location.

Here’s a look at it as well.

The initial list of retailers for this offering looks good and it is only going to grow as one would expect. At the end of the blog post Google puts out a request for retailers interested to fill out a form to get in the game.

My only question is why do you have to click on the More tab in order to get to the Shopping tab, which this function is under. For those in the know this will work but for the general searching population they may not know that this option even exists. I know there isn’t much room on mobile screen but a cool function that is buried may never get the exposure to make it truly successful.

But heck, what do I know?! Happy shopping for your blue dot specials.