Sydney · websites for local shops
See your website before you pay for it.
The site is built first. You look at it on an iPad, on your counter, with your own photos and your own menu already in it. If you don't like it, you've lost nothing — you never paid for it.
$485 to build · first six months of hosting free
Sample site — Golden Lotus Kitchen
Three steps, in this order.
You get found
Shops around Sydney that are good at what they do and have nothing online — or something built in 2011 that doesn't work on a phone.
The site gets built
Before any knock on the door, your site already exists. Your hours, your menu, your reviews, your photos. A few days' work.
You look at it
A visit at a quiet hour, iPad in hand. You either like it or you don't. No call, no email chain, no pitch deck.
Three sites, built the same way.
These are samples, not clients — an honest sample beats an invented logo wall. Drag the slider to see what the business had before.
Cantonese home cooking · Hurstville
Cut, colour, care · Chatswood
Plumber & electrician · Sydney-wide
Everything a local shop actually needs.
- A site of up to three pages that loads in under a second on a phone
- Your own domain, registered in your name — not an agency's
- Google Business Profile connected, so you show up on Maps
- Photos, menu or services, hours, and a tap-to-call button
- SSL and daily backups included. Some charge extra for these. They aren't billed here.
- Written for the people who actually search for you, in plain English
- Bilingual English/中文 if your customers want it, at no extra cost
You've probably been burnt before.
Nearly every owner has a story like it. Paid a few thousand, got a site, then found every small change cost $80 and nobody answered the email. Or worse — asked for their own files back and got quoted for the privilege.
So, in writing:
- The domain is registered in your name. In your name, not an agency's.
- The code is yours. Cancel any month and the files are handed over. The site keeps working.
- Small changes are included. New hours, new prices, a new photo — send a message, it's done. No per-change fee.
- No lock-in contract. Month to month, cancel any time.
- No charging for the basics. SSL and daily backups are part of every site, never billed as an extra.
$485 to build it. Six months of hosting free.
The build
Up to three pages, your copy, your photos, your menu or services, Google Business Profile connected, live on the internet.
Hosting
Hosting free for the first six months. Not a discount that quietly expires, and not a trial that bills you the moment you stop paying attention. Six months is long enough to see the site bring people through the door before it costs anything to keep.
Then $35 a month, covering hosting, SSL, daily backups, and up to 30 minutes of changes each month. Bigger jobs are quoted before they start, never after.
Domain
Domain $49 a year — registered in your name, renewed each year, and yours to take anywhere if you ever leave.
Or pay $350 for the year instead of $35 a month, and save $70.
Minimum to start
The $485 build plus the first year's $49 domain. Nothing else is payable for six months.
Total over 12 months
Total over 24 months
Both include GST. Those are the real numbers, at the same size as the monthly one, because a monthly price on its own tells you nothing.
Cancel any month. No contract.
Only if you want them.
- $95 onceEmail on your own domain — $95 once to set it up and move your old mail across. After that it's free for up to five mailboxes. If you need more than five, or you want Gmail specifically, that's $12 a month each and it goes straight to Google, with no markup.
- $150 eachExtra pages beyond the first three — $150 each
- $195 onceGoogle Business Profile setup and verification — $195 once, if you haven't claimed your listing yet
Merchant Row doesn't sell "search engine submission" — and it isn't worth buying anywhere. Google's own guidance says it costs nothing to appear in search results and calls paid submission services a useless exercise. Anyone charging for it is selling nothing.
Questions owners actually ask.
Any cost to see it first?
No. That's the whole idea. You see the finished site first.
What's the $35 a month actually for?
Hosting, SSL, daily backups, and up to half an hour of changes — new hours, new prices, a new photo. Anything bigger is quoted first.
Already have a website?
The replacement gets built and shown alongside it. If the old one is better, keep it.
Who owns it?
You do. Domain in your name, code handed over on request, any month.
How long does it take?
It already exists by the time you see it. Changes after that are usually same-day.
Pay yearly instead?
Yes — $350 for twelve months instead of $35 a month.
Do you do Chinese?
Yes — English and 中文 on the same site, no extra charge.
Ready to stop?
Cancel any month. The files are handed over and the domain stays yours.
No cold calls. A visit, instead.
Someone will come to you, at a time that suits the shop.