Why is the dry cleaning industry technologically behind the times?

While the girlfriend is away for the holidays I am trying to be productive and get some long-standing errands done. This includes getting some dry cleaning done.

So, being a tech-savvy person that I am (and thus Time Magazine's Person of the Year) I hit up Google Maps and searched for [dry cleaner] near me (using square brackets to denote what you entered in a text box online is common convention). Unfortunately it only turned up one. But I gave them a call to see what ther hours are today. Would have found out had they answered the phone or had an answering machine tell me.

OK, let's try searching [dry cleaning]. That turned up one farther away, but still within walking distance. Called them and I eventually was redirected to a fax machine (which, by the way, has not happened to me in ages).

Now, had this been a couple years back I could have understood why people didn't have a personal web site for their small business. You had to register the domain, get hosting, and then design a web site. Several steps that someone who was not computer literate might be scared of.

But these days these steps are in a single package from companies who make it extremely simple to get online. Yahoo Small Business has been around for a while. Google now has Google Apps for Your Domain. Both provide a complete solutions package for getting you online, including simple tools to use to make a web site (to the point that you can do proverbial colour-by-numbers page building).

And cost is not an issue either. Google Apps for Your Domain just started charging $10/year to register a domain name. Google already gives free hosting of web pages when you use Google Page Creator (which comes with Google Apps for Your Domain). You also get Gmail and Google Calendar, and Google Talk for your domain. It is a complete package to get a small business online from nothing for $10/year!

So when these small businesses don't even have a single web page online listing their business, contact info, and hours, it doesn't bode well for them that I will take them my business.