Oh yeah, it was a great idea to have give those out.  It actually fostered competition among the last 3 winners.  All three have already entered an amiibo competition and the Yoshi got to the third round.  The other two sadly just weren't trained, but then again Yoshi did have two months longer than the other two.  The amiibo thing is actually flying for us.  Other kids who bought walmart priced amiibos would come in to play.  If we could only find a direct retailer with Nintendo, we would just sell them at our store for the same price. 

We're a hobbyist, a pawn shop, a computer repair, a gamer hub, card tournament holder, videogame competition, karaoke night, talent night all rolled into one giant store.  It depends on what time of the month we're in.  Our daily function serves as a place where anyone may play a game of leagues of Legends or sit at a couch to play console games.  Pick which one you want, we got one for preference.  Not surprising, Nintendos taken the Game Couch with Smash bros.  With a 60 inch TV and 8 player smash.  We charge to rent the use of a "controller", wiimote, advance control, gamecube of course, for a dollar for a full hour.  If you have your own, use it.  The regulars already know to bring their controllers in their backpacks.  The stoners are the ones who rent for a dollar the most.  They always seem to forget to bring a controller. 

Though Leagues is our constant.  Kids come after school and bring their whole teams, 5 v 5.  We have a total of 20 computer so  get to have four full teams during a night.  Weekends are our theme night.  Friday tournaments, we're pretty hug so we can divide our efforts to Smash, TCG and of course Leagues.  We charge at a reasonable price of $2.00 for an hour and half of use.  If you pay $3, you get 2 and 30 minutes.  Sorry, time non-refundable.  When the time runs out, you may finish your game to the fullest, but you gots to be steppin' right after.  Saturdays are the more experimental nights.  People like singing and because of that we've given them a stage.  Sundays are our slow burn days.  We get our main rush just after 12pm when all the kids and adults who play games come by, then around 7 pm they start going home and only the die hard players are there.  Mostly adults who have no curfew.  By then it's just a bunch of dudes buying energy drinks and playing a rank game of leagues.  It's actually funny, they get so loud and the blame game is always so present. 

We buy games, we sell games.  If you need to print something, go ahead and use printer for free.  Colors $0.20 per page.  We limit our "free" to 3, $0.15 after 3, but we are forgiving for mistake prints.  We're currently looking into investing in a good 3D printer.  Goodness, imagine what kind of sells that's going to get us. 

Sorry for the rambling, I'm just so proud of my blood, sweat and tears.  In fact, I'm posting here at work.  It's like 1:00am.

Wow- it sounds like a real trhowback/communitty "do it all"  type of store-   that is great and something i don t see too often these days

sounds like a fun place for people to play, greet, meet etc  in this day of intenet gaming w people hunfdreds or thousands of miles away (both scenarios are cool) 

Making consumers suffer is not good for business and ultimately wont be good for the future of the company.

The fact that you made this thread to try and defend their business practice is likely because of all the negativity you've heard about Amiibos which is a clear sign of bad business, and who's fault is that? Nintendo, and they deserve every bit of negative comment in regards to Amiibos.

I wasn't defending, just offering info into Nintendo's madness.  I agree with you, this is bad business, but good for them as the title of the thread implies.  For the uninitiated, amiibo is just this thing Nintendo is doing, but for the above casual gamers like me and maybe you, it's a big deal.  I'm trying to be unbias as I possibly could be.  I don't like that fact that I can't find a Mega man amiibo unless I go to ebay.  In fact, I'm agreeing with you.  I created this thread to try to understand why they're doing this and so far I've made my arguements, just arguements for their strategy. 

I'm trying to be a robotic about this, looking at it as Nintendo would for their current situation.  Nintendo has a good business model that sees their amiibo fly off the shelf whenever they sell them and despite a bad business with the whole scalper thing is for the customer, they continue to sell out of amiibo and there are still a strong demand for them.  Nintendo likes it this way or else they would have implemented something else, something better like direct to customer order, but they're not.  I'm not condoning it, I'm just arguing their stance.  

"Making consumers suffer is not good for business and ultimately wont be good for the future of the company." -This is what tabacco company does all the time.  Don't tell it can't work with Nintendo and their amiibo.  You act like Nintendo has never acted against public opinion, they have and they aren't all to concerned with the backlash, that's why they do it.  And please, you make it sound like amiibo fans are dying because lack of amiibo.  "Suffering", gamers are such drama queens.  This strategy is better for Nintendo than the alternative. 

Comparing Amiibo to cigarettes isn't exactly the same thing, but at least you can always find cigarettes?  Cigarettes causes suffering to the consumers but at least they got it before suffering.  Gamers that 'suffering' in this situation is because they cant even get their hands on the amiibos they want to begin with.

It would be good business to see amiibos flying off the shelf but they're really not flying off the shelves at all when the ones people really want barely even get on the shelf lol.  I was lucky to get a Megaman, and when I asked the worker how many they got, they said 2! Yea I don't consider Megaman amiibo really flying off the shelves when places are hardly getting any stock of it.  You'll always see plenty of Mario, Princess, Luigi etc.. cause nobody wants/cares for that.

The problem with Nintendo Amiibo situation is the lack of stock with Amiibos people really wants and not some generic Nintendo character nobody cares about.

The day of the announcement of the next wave of amiibos (Wave 4) I preordered all of them (Robin, Lucina, Wario, Charizard, Ness, Pac Man), I got a call last week saying they had to cancel my preorder for Robin and Lucina.  Now tell me how exactly is is that good business for Nintendo, or even a good image to the company? They can't even meet the demands of preorders from the launch of the preorders, but im sure they'll make plenty of the others that weren't cancelled and you likely wont see those flying off shelves like the other generic amiibos nobody cares for (aside from Ness as I think he's a Gamespot exclusive).  Anybody that tries collecting amiibos would know it to be foolish to think they'll be getting any more Robin and Lucina amiibos.

Comparing Amiibo to cigarettes isn't exactly the same thing, but at least you can always find cigarettes?  Cigarettes causes suffering to the consumers but at least they got it before suffering.  Gamers that 'suffering' in this situation is because they cant even get their hands on the amiibos they want to begin with. -You miss the analogy.  Tabacco companies are willing to have their customers suffer for profit.  With lack of production for the more rare amiibo, this is nintendo not caring about customer outcry.  But that's the point,

It would be good business to see amiibos flying off the shelf but they're really not flying off the shelves at all when the ones people really want barely even get on the shelf lol.  I was lucky to get a Megaman, and when I asked the worker how many they got, they said 2! Yea I don't consider Megaman amiibo really flying off the shelves when places are hardly getting any stock of it.  You'll always see plenty of Mario, Princess, Luigi etc.. cause nobody wants/cares for that. -Just goes to prove my theory, nintendo is short supplying retailers to keep the hunt alive, to keep interest in amiibo.  Sure, luigi, mario, peach, pikachu, all of them in stock and all of them really known characters.  They are the entry level amiibo nintendo wants everyone to buy.  Megaman, Shulk, wii fit trainer, Wario, etc, they're the rare and common rare amiibo.  This is nintendo's foray into the collectable market.  Other businesses do this as well, stamp collectors know this, the automobile companies do this, Trading card game companies do this, keep short supply to build interest and put value into the products.  Sure, they don't charge more, but they know that the scalpers will take notice and jock up the prices for them.  This in turm lets customers know that amiibo are looked after merchandise and if you see a rare one, grab it.  It really is somewhat of a game.

The problem with Nintendo Amiibo situation is the lack of stock with Amiibos people really wants and not some generic Nintendo character nobody cares about. -That's the whole premise behind amiibo.  If I'm wrong, then why are there only 2 megaman shipped to your local retailer?  Nintendo knows there is more demand for just two, the retailers know, the customers know, everyone and they're mama who are game affecianado know, yet nintendo keeps them at a short supply.  This has to be intentional. 

The day of the announcement of the next wave of amiibos (Wave 4) I preordered all of them (Robin, Lucina, Wario, Charizard, Ness, Pac Man), I got a call last week saying they had to cancel my preorder for Robin and Lucina.  Now tell me how exactly is is that good business for Nintendo, or even a good image to the company? They can't even meet the demands of preorders from the launch of the preorders, but im sure they'll make plenty of the others that weren't cancelled and you likely wont see those flying off shelves like the other generic amiibos nobody cares for (aside from Ness as I think he's a Gamespot exclusive).  Anybody that tries collecting amiibos would know it to be foolish to think they'll be getting any more Robin and Lucina amiibos. -Relativity.  It's not good business that potential for a product isn't reached, but it is a good sign when before it hits shelves, it's already gone.  Let's say you have a max of 100 amiibo and all 100 will sell eventually.  Of the 100, you have to decide which characters to make of.  Well, there is Shulk, not a big name, but mario and pikachu are, so I'll make 25 of each and they'll sell all eventually, 50 left.  Let's see, how about Marth, he's pretty big in the smash community, let's make 10.  Wii fit trainer, a female character which no real gamer thinks is really cool, so only 5.  So we have other characters, Wario, Toon Link, Link, etc.  We finally get to the 100 characters.  Marth sells out quick , so does shulk, so does every other character except for Mario and Pikachu, but that doesn't matter, they're icons and will sell off eventually because they're just so iconic.  What, they just sold out before the release date, people are selling them for triple on second hand stores online, that's crazy, let's make more.  Wait up, let's not jump the gun, we have several more waves to pour out into the market.  So, let's not go and make 25 more Megaman, instead let's release the other waves and see if it's the same thing.  What's the big deal, we'll make another 100 and all will sell out anyways.  Fast foward to several waves later and the market has an outcry, scalpers have dilluted the market and so we don't know which are really what's wanted.  But it doesn't matter as sure enough the next wave and the next wave will continue to sell out before it reaches the shelves.  And there lies the strategy.  Create more amiibo, keep them wanting more, keep supply short, angry fans, but if it all 100 sell including the more iconic and more readily avalable, the entry level amiibo, and there's still strong demand, keep going.  No need to kill the geeese that lay the golden egg.  Bad business, but it would be worst business to kill off the geese now that keeps them constantly in profit.

Look, again, I am not condoning this from Nintendo, I'm just saying, this is what it looks like and if they don't change now, then that is the Amiibo Platform.  Designed to be a buyer's market, to be short in supply, to be demanded and sought after as if it were a  Black Lotus(Magic the Gathering, look it up).  And for the sake of longevity, nintendo is likely to be doing this for as long as they can, before the bubble bursts.