I'm in the NJ/PA area of the US. I have yet to see a Wii in stock. Mostly people get laughed at when they ask for them at the game stores.

I work at a Toys R Us in Saint Louis, Missouri. We have never held a Wii in stock for more than 24 hours, and we regularly get shipments of 30+ every two weeks.

None in any game stores I visit around London and a lot have signs saying Wii out of stock: reserve yours for £20', although there are empty boxes which maybe gives the impression they have a supply.

A 'Cex' store has 1 preowned Wii for sale....£220.

Never heard of a console needing to still be reserved so many months after release.

Here's a question for the U.S. types: Why won't EB/Gamestop take preorders for Wiis? It seems silly that they would turn away a sale but they won't do it. For all they know the buyer could find one at Toys R Us, Wal Mart, Target, Best Buy, etc. and they will lose no only the sale of the console, but any accessories and games to go with it. At this point taking preorders would allow them to capture an otherwise possibly lost customer...

 We did take pre orders about 4 months ago. The word got out fast: we had a queue of 200 people within four days. That was enough to keep us sold out for almost two months. Let's imagine we kept that queue open for, say, three more weeks. Based on that average, we'd have a queue of 1000 people. See the problem? 

I think it's silly too, as it shouldn't be that hard to offer.  However, it's apparently their policy for all things though.  They will only let you preorder things that haven't launched yet.  Things are rarely supply constrained for long, and so they are just not setup to deal with it.  So if you want an elite 360 or whatever they are called, and it's sold out, you can't preorder it either.

That said, I think the real reason is they like to sell "bundles" now.  We have no simple wii, but... you get this bundle with wii, wii play, and two more games of your choice for $395 and I think we can special order that for you...

Why doesn't Nintendo let you do that, and just give them an order for 4000 units?  Then they could guage demand and increase production accordingl...  Not as nice on manufacturing though, as it will cause a much sharper fall when supply reaches demand...

Of course if it's going to take more then a couiple of weeks, consumes will likely put themselfs on multiple preorder lists if there is no penalty for withdraw.  That could always be solved with a deposit to preorder though...

Younglings, i like that, yeah it has been done, I think I posted it like a month ago, I asked if the Wii was seriously hard to find..It still is here ,small town 70 miles Near Portland Oregon, Ps3 still on the shelves..wii no where!

 Were your pre-orders pay full price in advance?  I.e. pay fully for the system plus tax or was it a $20 dollar deposit or just put your name on a list?  Call me nuts but I can't imagine that many people paying 100 percent up front but maybe I'm wrong.