It isn't technically Google-operated: they've outsourced it, which is fairly common for promotional goods. (McDonalds doesn't specialize in making T-shirts, after all.)

What I find hilarious is that if you buy an $8 T-shirt from Google you can actually talk to a human being about it, which makes that approximately the only Google-brand product sold for under $100,000 where that is reliably true.

The funniest thing about it that it runs ASP on IIS.

Google has had a store for a long time. As far as I can tell it was at one time the only way they were making money - before AdWords and the Google Appliance were invented.

For more details check this earlier post on HN : http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=652807 Apparantly google is outsourcing it to some 3rd party (in this case it's Merchandise Mania Ltd, Borehamwood, UK)

Forget Google merch...I want some "Bing Bling"

And the pens (http://www.googlestore.com/product.asp?catid=4&code=GO42...), at least the previous incarnation of them, write amazingly well. Does anyone know where I can get them cheaper (i.e. not GOOG branded)?

$5.20 (plus shipping) for 4 pens that "write amazingly well" is too much money? Why not just buy the ones you like and stop spending time/energy on the "problem"?

> $5.20 (plus shipping) for 4 pens that "write amazingly well" is too much money?

It's not about the money by any means. 1) I use a pen pretty rarely. 2) I'm not spending time or energy on the "problem."

When you asked for a cheaper source, I assumed it was somehow about the money.

Quite a few companies have one. Yahoo! has one too (http://companystore.yahoo.com/).

I'm always amazed at the amount of people that stop in front of the Yahoo! sign to take photos.

Pretty much any large branded company has their own store. Cisco has a physical store on campus that sell branded stuff.

now you know.

and knowing is half the battle

Has anyone tried the bean bags - are they big enough for adults?

Yes. I have one and it's great.

I didn't know Google Checkout was available in Australia now.

Pretty annoyed that they want CC details before telling me shipping, though. I wanted some Google grocery bags!

They also have an on-site store for guests.

Oh god, you guys KNOW the hackers at google have so many cheap google soiveniers at home.

I don't know if this is exactly 'life changing'... although it is pretty cool.

I love the "SPF 30 Google Sun Stick" :)