superchunk said:
It's has nothing to do with the actual costs in building the Wii. Do you think Nintendo couldn't be really profatible with the DS at $100? I'm sure of it. They have not because they don't need to. Sales for the DS after nearly 3 years at the same price are still very high and their competition, PSP, is still way below them in every month WW. The same will be for the Wii. They don't need to. I'm sure they could arlready drop to $200 and still make a healthy profit, but why? Sales are still at all time highs and they are still outselling the competition in every market by a large margin. My Summer of 2009 was not a definite, it is an at the very earlist possibility. Based on Ebay pricing for the three units, I feel that Wii could be more expensive than the elite or 80g ps3 and still sell more. |
Of course nothing is definite. Even if anyone was being 100% resolute on any prediction regarding the console business, it hardly makes their stance any more likely.
But by making comparisons with Nintendo's pricing strategy with the DS, the odds are more likely your educated/informed guess will be more accurate.
Nintendo as a company is fairly predictable due to its conservative nature. If anything, they've become even more predictable in the interest of preserving the current strength of the company's underlying financials, which are the best they've ever been in the company's history.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again; before Nintendo drops price on the Wii, we will see new colored consoles (a given) and possibly limited edition bundles with custom themes (like the custom Zelda DS bundle or Brain Age bundle) before any sort of price drop is realized so long as the Wii continues to match sales with current production.
It won't be until we start to see regular levels of inventory at retail outlets (over a period of months) that a price reduction option will be explored. This is far more important to Nintendo than competing with MS or Sony on a price/value comparison with hardware. In short, pricing of the 360 and PS3 is not the driving factor for potential reduced pricing for the Wii, UNLESS price cuts significantly effect Wii inventory levels.
But as for the claim that the Wii could retail at $450 or $500 (above the 360 Elite or 40GB PS3) and still out perfom in sales, you couldn't me more off the target. It's a faulty assumption to say that because there is a limited market of people willing to pay over MSRP for a consumer product that it would sell at those inflated prices to the overall market.
It matters less anyway since Ebay pricing for the Wii fluctuates regularly depending on demand. It's not as though Nintendo or any company would constantly keep altering the price of their consumer electronics to match. Last I checked, the Wii was going for about $300 on Ebay, which is less of a premium than just a couple months ago.
But that $250 price point has been one of the key factors in Nintendo's success this generation.
