More Wii Shortages This Holiday Season?

Though Nintendo continues cranking out more units of its popular console, it might not be enough this holiday season.

Failing economy be damned; people are still nabbing up Wiis like they are delicious, syrupy hotcakes. It's almost two years after the system's original launch, and some folks are still having a hard time getting their hands on the darn things. Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aimé recently told the Los Angeles Times the gaming giant continues to boost Wii production significantly. Even so, he's unsure if they'll be able to meet the demand over the holidays.

"Nintendo has continually raised the production levels of the Wii hardware. We're now producing 2.4 million units a month worldwide. Last year, we made 1.6 million a month. So we've made a 33 percent increase," said Fils-Aimé "One of our competitors' projects they will sell 10 million consoles worldwide this year. For us, that's three months of production. We're producing an unprecedented level of hardware to try to meet demand."

Despite the grisly state of the economy, Nintendo hasn't seen any negative impact in regards to Wii and DS sales, according to Fils-Aimé, who touted the two platforms for driving the majority of financial growth in the industry in the first nine months of 2008. In fact, he said retailers view the Wii and DS as a means of drawing customers to their stores.

With the Wii continuing to sell out at retail and the DS still going strong, Nintendo doesn't expect to see things let up as the holidays approach. Whether or not it can keep up with consumer demand is another question. Hoping to track down a Wii this holiday season? Fils-Aimé suggests keeping a close eye on store circulars and checking out their websites. Like, duh. And when you see one; buy it.

"We're flowing products into stores on a very regular basis. Once you see it on the shelf, you ought to buy it," he said. "While we're bringing 50 percent higher level of supply into the market this holiday, we don't know if the demand will be even higher than that."

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Here we go again...

Ebay for $700 anyone

smallharmlesskitten:
Ebay for $700 anyone

I dare everyone here to run into your local mall on Christmas Eve and shout at the top of your voice "Wii for sale!". That would be something to see!

I've been telling my customers since July to get the Wii sooner rather than later. We've been managing to keep them in stock for more than an hour lately, but around Thanksgiving, that's going to drop back down and nobody's going to be able to find them. Long story short, this really isn't news to me, lol.

Oy, if it's coming from the president himself that "we might not be able to meet demand" then they're not going to meet demand.

Get your asses in gear over the Nintendo! You should have been this productive in the first place so we wouldn't have this problem. Don't you have any sympathy for the people staying infront of their local store at 3:00am in the morning only to find out that the shipment was screwed and only half the intended amount of Wii's were shipped (AKA, my poor friend)? It's been 2 years, if the 360 can mostly iron out the RROD problems then a simple shipping order shouldn't be to hard for you.

Whatever, either way they're counting their money like nobodies business.

God, I really sounded like a bitch now that I look over that >_>;

They won't cut the shortages because it's just an easy trick to maintain high demand on a popular and cheap product.

Two years later, and they have not cranked up production volumes high enough? Get real.

It's still being suggested that Nintendo can't meet the demand? They're obviously limiting production intentionally.

Arbre:
They won't cut the shortages because it's just an easy trick to maintain high demand on a popular and cheap product.

Two years later, and they have not cranked up production volumes high enough? Get real.

That's pretty much exactly what I'm thinking, but that doesn't mean I can't complain :P

That's what you get for building the thing out of gamecube spare parts. The associated factories are all outdated and the materials are typicaly out of mainstream production.

At my store, the wiis are sticking around a lot longer than before, mostly since those that come by have already got one, it's the Wii Fit that's selling out within the hour. Not that the Wiis aren't selling, they still go quick, but now we're getting a lot more in our drop shipments and are in somewhat steady supply.

Somehow, I haven't snapped at all the "Why don't you have Wii Fits in?" questions I get. The concept of a drop shipment doesn't sink in no matter how many times you repeat yourself.

/end retail rage