Difficulties of running a business in Canada
Posted on | April 12, 2010 | No Comments
There are probably a LOT of items that I could outline with the above title. However the latest is just enough to really infuriate me.
After adding King’s Crate to Google Local Business Center (this will enable our company to show up in Google Maps), I was encouraged to check out the Google Merchant Center. Upon further reading, it appeared as though I would be able to add all of our products, and they would then show up as direct links to our site for potential customers to view.
Now mind you, this was AFTER I had submitted all of our company location information, so the Google “machine” was well aware of where we conducted business.
To add the products to the program, I had a choice of adding an Excel tab delimited spreadsheet or an XML document. Since we are often adding products to our database, I thought it best to create a PHP file that would read our database and extract the relevant information in the required format, therefore creating a dynamic XML file, eliminating the need to constantly update our products within the Merchant Center. I was fortunate to run across a great little video by John Morris to help me out with some of the little details (How to Create an XML Data Feed File for Google Product Search Using PHP).
So after hours of coding and testing, finding all the proper attributes I could use, I was ready to upload my XML document. That is when I discover the “Target Country”.
Now I see the drop down box, and notice United States is the default. Well, no biggie, I’ll just change it to … United Kingdom or Germany. What, no Canada? I start to frantically search the internet looking for where I screwed up, but no, it seems that Canada is not supported.
Yes, I realize that while my business may be located in Canada I could sell to other countries, could they not have given a little warning that I won’t be able to target the country I’m listed in? I came to this section FROM Google Local Business Center, a place where I specifically entered in all of my geographic information, INCLUDING a 60km radius that we deliver to.
I guess it’s another case of one hand not knowing what the other hand is doing, but it’s just another slap in the face when you’re trying to run a business in Canada. Why here, look who is at the top of the list of largest trading partners to the United States – oh it’s little old Canada, above even China and Mexico.
This was more of a rant than anything, a little Rodney Dangerfield self pity. Just frustrated at the number of times this happens, whether it’s products that are unavailable in Canada or the price of books that are never modified even though our dollar is almost at parity with the US greenback.
We’d love to hear your thoughts on any similar roadblocks you’ve faced, but more importantly we’d like to hear of companies/services that are inclusive of Canada. We are – after all – the Olympic Men’s Ice Hockey Gold Medal holders. Show a little respect 
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