Interesting find, euclid. Nintendo needs to be stockpiling like a mamma jamma or seriously ramp up production for the holidays. If they don't do one or the other MS is going to win the holiday season(at least in America).

Why don't you just look into Nintendo's financial reports. Wii shipments were up 29 % or 780k in the last quarter (Apr-Jun) over the previous quarter (Jan-Mar). This pretty much proves that they were shipping Wiis as fast they could make them, or do you think they could speed up their factories even faster than that without exploding cost or quality issues? 29 % in 3 months are awesome.

The problem for American and Japanese customers is that Nintendo directed the bulk of that increase to Europe/other territories (370k for a 55 % increase over the previous quarter). Wiis have been well in stock in Europe for a couple of months now. You can walk into any store and pick up a Wii. I think that was a wise move by Nintendo. Europe had always been a weak market for them until the DS arrived, so they made it their first priority to get Europe in stock this summer, with other markets to follow.

So if we look at the 780k increase last quarter (to 3.4 million units shipped), Nintendo will probably produce and ship more than 4 million units in this quarter (Jul-Sep) and 5 million in the next (Oct-Dec) without any stockpiling involved. I think Wiis will be well in stock in Japan und America when the autumn starts and be sold out again after Thinksgiving in the US and New Year in Japan. By February Wii shortages will finally be a thing of the past.

Well I personally think that Nintendo both is stockpilling and shipping more. The extra 2.5 million Wii that will be shipped this fiscal year will most probarbly first be seen during the holiday season.

The shippments have gone up, but not as much as they have increased the production.

robjoh,
How can you compare produced vs. sold to retail? Nobody knows the number of produced Wiis. Nintendo only reports sold to retail.

I actually think this was a bad move, I wouldn't reinforce a weaker market until they showed appetite for the product. It makes no sense to ship a bunch of units just so they can sit on store shelves, and before someone says "well nintendo already sold it!"...realize that they are not oblivious to the unit's ability to sell itself. They want the units they are shipping in the hands of consumers so they can keep the buzz going.

@Silverseen,

Uhm, if you look at last X-mas '06 the Wii outsold the 360 WW, and this is giving the 360 the entire month of Nov when Wii was only out for a week of Nov and you have to remember the Wii wasn't even released world wide until another 2 weeks after their first Nov week.

360

• Nov: 831,592
  
• Dec: 1,999,925
• Total: 2,831,517
  

Wii

• Nov: 535,008
• Dec: 2,508,449
• Total: 3,043,457

Well we more or less now that Wii is supply constraind in Japan and USA, EU is another thing but I don't think EU would get that much shippment if not USA get more. Sales has gone up, but not as much as the production should have been done if Nintendo is true to their statement  that they are increasing there shippment to 16.5 millions then Nintendo will have more in stock someday. I personally think it is a wise move, so I am not complaining or saying that Nintendo is creating shortages, I am just stating that I think nintendo is trying to atleast keep 25-50k WW/week to have extra Wii:s during big game releases. 

 I'm not suggesting they are overshipping to Europe, but filling store shelves around the world is their goal. If nobody needed products on a store shelve your local Walmart could operate from a one room apartment. Shelve units are good as long they don't stay there forever.

Their Wii "sold to retail" figure should be ahead of "sold to consumers" by maybe 1-2 million units worldwide at any time to make sure that there's always something on the shelve when a consumer walks into a store. So to reach that goal in Europe they should be maybe 300k-600k units ahead of "sold to consumers". 

And if you think reinforcing Europe is a bad goal then ask yourself why Nintendo never sold more than 60 million consoles in a generation while the PS1 and PS2 each sold more than 100 million. Europe and other markets made the whole difference.

This summer, while the product is still scarce, a Wii sold in Europe is more valuable for Nintendo than a Wii sold in the US or Japan, because in Europe they can win first time customers for their consoles. That said, shipments to the US and Japan have also increased during the last quarter.

robjoh,

We may never know for sure if they are holding back units, but have you checked the fiscal reports so far? Nintendo's actual shipments (sold-to-retail) went up 29 % within 3 months and that is just huge! The whole notion that Wii shipments were not up comes from the fact that NPD and Media Create et. al. don't report on Europe. Nintendo's official reports state unmistakably that shipments have been rising fast since the Spring.

If you don't believe me please go to:

http://www.nintendo.co.jp/kessan/english.html

What you quoted there from my last post was  in reference to the idea that Nintendo should focus its shipments in Europe. I by no means suggested they should ignore or abandon the EU just that it was never a big region for them so saturating the EU's pipeline with Wii's wouldn't be the greatest use of the consoles.

To answer your question about how many consoles Nintendo has sold in a generation, it has far far more to do with the market during the early generations than anything else.  And by the time the markets were capable of supporting those kinds of numbers the Playstation came along.

As for first time customers, I think the Wii has a lot of first time customers for Nintendo in every country right now. So I don't know that I can really subscribe to the idea that one country is better or worse than another for them..at least not for that reason.

PS:
European shipments will probably be down this quarter because the pent-up demand is satisfied and Nintendo can resume to just working for the regular demand. Remember, a lot of the scarcity right now is about pent-up demand, a one time thing, not regular demand. The pent-up demand consists of BOTH waiting customers and retailers wanting shelf units and it will be in the millions (mabye 2-3 million). Once Europe is done Nintendo can shrink the bubble in Japan and the US next. It remains to be seen if they can achieve it before or after the holidays - during the holidays regular demand while rise so high they won't have the chance to deal with pent-up demand.

 I see what you mean, but it's just a fact that they were shipping a lot to Europe last quarter, so we don't have to argue if they should have done that. When you said the markets were different during the NES and the SNES days, are you referring to the economic development in Eastern Europe?

Because Western Europe (I'm referring to the countries of Europe that were not communist until 1989) has been just as wealthy in the 80s and 90s as they are today, and they make up 80 % of the European population. It's just that British, German, French, Italian, Scandinavian and Benelux customers never bought that many Nintendo consoles.

Or where you referring to the fact that Nintendo couldn't offer a "mature" product like Sony? I think that's a factor, too, but if you compare NES vs. PS1 ( http://vgchartz.com/worldcons.php ) and look at the territories, the PS1 won by 31 million units in Europe, but just 7 million units in America and 2 million units in Japan. As I said, Europe made the whole difference and Nintendo has to win more console customers there.