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Forums - Nintendo Discussion - UPDATED:Do you think the Wii U will get a price cut this year?

 

How much do you think a $200-250 price will help Wii U?

Massive Boost over weeks 14 14.29%
 
Substantial Boost 29 29.59%
 
Moderate Boost 42 42.86%
 
Little or no effect 13 13.27%
 
Total:98
S.T.A.G.E. on 24 April 2015

Iwata said they cannot right now. The Wii U bundle with Splatoon is going to be $300.

Fail.


Nintendo is out of touch. Bundling Splatoon so early is stupid. When people see the PS4, One, PS3 and 360 with holiday prices they will laugh at the Wii U (again) with bundles which are only $50 more for the Xbox One. If Sony drops the PS4 to $350 for the holiday Nintendo is a non-factor in every sense of the word for the rest of the year.



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Dr.Henry_Killinger on 24 April 2015
Materia-Blade said:
Dr.Henry_Killinger said:

a $249 Wii U doesn't stand a ghost of a chance against a $299 XO let alone if both PS4 and XO drop to $299

Best chance is for Wii U to drop earlier than both, and then drop again in holidays. Just the effect of dropping. even by $25 could cause a boost, but that really depends on marketing more than anything else.

 

Honestly, they need to fix there Terrible marketting, this is why the pricecuts have barely done anything/unstainable, and the wii U's poor baseline as it is. The source of many of the Wii U's faults

"a $249 Wii U doesn't stand a ghost of a chance against a $299 XO let alone if both PS4 and XO drop to $299"

Based on?

"Best chance is for Wii U to drop earlier than both, and then drop again in holidays. Just the effect of dropping. even by $25 could cause a boost, but that really depends on marketing more than anything else."

Sounds like a horrible strategy. The wii u will probably get a pricecut this year and only next year will se another permanent price cut.

The only difference between dropping twice and dropping once, is the loss between the two price drops. That doesn't mean they won't drop the same amount. Its better than dropping and being overshadowed like it has been previous holidays.



In this day and age, with the Internet, ignorance is a choice! And they're still choosing Ignorance! - Dr. Filthy Frank

Dr.Henry_Killinger on 24 April 2015
sc94597 said:
Dr.Henry_Killinger said:

The price cut has a stronger effect on the XO then the Wii U. So even if they drop by the same amount, doesn't mean the increase in sales will be the same aka the effect of the price drop. The Wii U must drop more to compensate, assuming all else is equal. They would have to drop even more if they don't market well.

How did you determine this? We don't know the price elasticity of demand of either consumer-base, nor do we know anything about their demand curves really. 

We do know how long the consoles have been avaliable, at what prices, and how they have sold over time. Even if these two consoles hadn't already dropped before, which they have

So we can make a reasonable (ball park) guess.



In this day and age, with the Internet, ignorance is a choice! And they're still choosing Ignorance! - Dr. Filthy Frank

sc94597 on 24 April 2015
Dr.Henry_Killinger said:
sc94597 said:

How did you determine this? We don't know the price elasticity of demand of either consumer-base, nor do we know anything about their demand curves really. 

We do know how long the consoles have been avaliable, at what prices, and how they have sold over time. Even if these two consoles hadn't already dropped before, which they have

So we can make a reasonable (ball park) guess.

Only if you assume the demand curve is linear, which is a poor assumption, as real world markets usually don't have linear demand curves. A $50 price drop from $400 to $350 is not going to have the same effect as a $50 price drop from $350 to $300 or $300 to $250. The following graph illustrates what a real-world demand curve might look like. 

 



Dr.Henry_Killinger on 24 April 2015
sc94597 said:
Dr.Henry_Killinger said:

We do know how long the consoles have been avaliable, at what prices, and how they have sold over time. Even if these two consoles hadn't already dropped before, which they have

So we can make a reasonable (ball park) guess.

Only if you assume the demand curve is linear, which is a poor assumption, as real world markets usually don't have linear demand curves. A $50 price drop from $400 to $350 is not going to have the same effect as a $50 price drop from $350 to $300 or $300 to $250. The following graph illustrates what a real-world demand curve might look like. 

 

The guesstimate I proposed doesn't imply a linear demand curve, it approximates base demand as a function of sales over time (Linear) and assumes the success of the price drop (sales gain/demand incease) increases (exponential) as the overall price drops.

This is a guesstimate where the Wii U would underperform in the case that the gap is consistent even if they dropped in price. If Nintendo was concerned about selling more and using a price drop do so, this would only be considered in the case that we don't have better information. 



In this day and age, with the Internet, ignorance is a choice! And they're still choosing Ignorance! - Dr. Filthy Frank

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sc94597 on 24 April 2015
Dr.Henry_Killinger said:
sc94597 said:

Only if you assume the demand curve is linear, which is a poor assumption, as real world markets usually don't have linear demand curves. A $50 price drop from $400 to $350 is not going to have the same effect as a $50 price drop from $350 to $300 or $300 to $250. The following graph illustrates what a real-world demand curve might look like. 

 

The guesstimate I proposed doesn't imply a linear demand curve, it approximates base demand as a function of sales over time (Linear) and assumes the success of the price drop (sales gain/demand incease) increases (exponential) as the overall price drops.

At most we have two data-points ($350 and $300 for Wii U Deluxe.) Any "meaningful" extrapolation must be linear. If you are going to use exponential growth how would you accurately determine the growth rate from only two data points? We have the initial conditions (50k for XBO at $500 and 30k for Wii U at $350.) Then we have two more data points for XBO (@$400 and @$350) and one for Wii U (@$300.) I mean there really is no way to predict how a price cut from $300 -> $250 will affect the Wii U based off its previous price-cut and the XBO based off its previous price-cuts. The data is just too little to create a useful trend. It would be easier to predict the value price of targetted demographics, but that is also extremely hard. 



Dr.Henry_Killinger on 24 April 2015
sc94597 said:
Dr.Henry_Killinger said:

The guesstimate I proposed doesn't imply a linear demand curve, it approximates base demand as a function of sales over time (Linear) and assumes the success of the price drop (sales gain/demand incease) increases (exponential) as the overall price drops.

At most we have two data-points ($350 and $300 for Wii U Deluxe.) Any "meaningful" extrapolation must be linear. If you are going to use exponential growth how would you accurately determine the growth rate from only two data points? We have the initial conditions (50k for XBO at $500 and 30k for Wii U at $350.) Then we have two more data points for XBO (@$400 and @$350) and one for Wii U (@$300.) I mean there really is no way to predict how a price cut from $300 -> $250 will affect the Wii U based off its previous price-cut and the XBO based off its previous price-cuts. The data is just too little to create a useful trend. It would be easier to predict the value price of targetted demographics, but that is also extremely hard. 

Yes yes, I agree with what your saying. But I'm also pulling data from correlations, which we do have, not the price drops themselves, but the overall performance on the market and the duration of that performance. In essence I am extrapolating from those correlations, which I admit is terribly crude, but given the lack of data the alternative "correct" approximations can't be made.

I'm assuming a lot of things to make up for it, and since this is a worst case estimate, I figure I have some leeway here.

I wouldn't go as far as to say I making up things, but since I am assuming things based off of tangential correlations, its a stretch



In this day and age, with the Internet, ignorance is a choice! And they're still choosing Ignorance! - Dr. Filthy Frank

Dunban67 on 24 April 2015
mountaindewslave said:
Dunban67 said:

That is what i thought-  Can t find anything from Nintendo that says the Wii U is making money-  Yet you are sure that it is- based on????

 

Tell me this-  What makes you beleive the Wii U is making money?  Do you even have a hypothisis?  


Nintendo is extremly careful financially. the Wii U at this point is likely either making a little money or barely losing any. you won't find stores overstocked with the system, and you don't see the price point dropping/discounts because of this

simply selling more systems gives no gurantee that manufacturing costs will drop nor does the Wii U have a big enough sized library of software to really backup that plan of action. I think the library is fantastic but its not HUGE by any means and the only reason I can see for desiring to push a lot more system sales is if you were expecting to sell a lot of games (questionable at this point)

losing as much market hare as Nintendo has re theri home console is not good for the brand and it makes it much more difficult to bring whatever their next gen device to market succesfully   -  Nintendo s market share is at an all time low -   Companies, including Nintendo typically fight to keep their market share/customers for a reason-  Nintendo did not defend their console or market share as far as the W U goes -  The must have alot of confidence in their next console becasue it will take alot to win back alot of the market share they so easily let go



zorg1000 on 24 April 2015
S.T.A.G.E. said:

Iwata said they cannot right now. The Wii U bundle with Splatoon is going to be $300.

Fail.


Nintendo is out of touch. Bundling Splatoon so early is stupid. When people see the PS4, One, PS3 and 360 with holiday prices they will laugh at the Wii U (again) with bundles which are only $50 more for the Xbox One. If Sony drops the PS4 to $350 for the holiday Nintendo is a non-factor in every sense of the word for the rest of the year.

Iwata said that in early February, that doesn't mean it can't happen later like in mid-late September, 7.5 months after the statement.

Why is bundling Splatoon so early stupid? It's a limited edition bundle at a single retailer.

Last year Xbox One was $200 more than Wii U, this year Xbox One is $50 more than Wii U, yet Wii U is up YoY. I'm not really sure the price of the competitors has that huge of an affect on Wii U since their games don't really target the same demographics.



When the herd loses its way, the shepard must kill the bull that leads them astray.

gabzjmm23 on 24 April 2015

i really hope they'll do a price cut before the holidays this year. A lot of people really wanted to buy a Wii U but the price is hindering it. With new exclusive games coming up and other consoles won't offer it. It is a must to have a Wii U.