OK, newsflash for some of you:

Every electronics company in the world stock piles product for the holidays.




This is business, deal with it. I sick of people spouting about stuff they know little about. They have investors to appease, stock prices to maintain or increase, public and press to impress. All of which you do not do by selling the same amount units in December as you did in May.

Are we all clear on that now?

No. Some people will just never understand, so I'd suggest to give up.

Yeah, that's pretty much what I did. It's like trying to convince people OJ is a murderer.

Which means a bare minimum of 3 million units shipped in November and December alone. And by the way he's boasting about it, I'd say that it'll be closer to twice that number.

Let's not forget they'll have to sell 18 million units by December if they are to meet their forcasts for FY 2008. And that's if they don't revise the forecast upwards again in a few weeks.

He is very sure about there being plenty of Wiis this holiday.

I don't know why some people think this is a bad thing, I don't care anymore. All I can say is, let's wait til January and see what you think then.

We could read stories about the Wii outselling the competition all year long in 2007, by a wider margin than it is now, but then barely outselling the PS3 and 360 during the holidays. People will say the competition is doing better! Catching up!

Or...Nintendo could anticipate a holiday rush and stockpile a little bit at a time...so we read about the Wii outselling the competition all year 2007, by a smaller margin, but still substantial, and then selling a TON more during the holidays...easily beating the competition.

I'm not sure of what will all happen, but that seems more likely and definitely better for Nintendo...news sites will be going on and on about Nintendo's holiday if they sell well. That's just business. They're not depriving the consumers of Wiis...they ship what they ship.

11 months out of the year: "Aw man, no Wiis. Eh, I'll try again next week."
Christmas season: "Aw man, no Wiis. I'll get Jimmy a PlayStation 3 instead."

That is why they (and everyone else) stockpile for the Christmas season.

It's one big season where everyone goes shopping at once. It's better for Nintendo and for the consumer to shop then, because it's nearly guaranteed that items will be in stock.

If Nintendo did not stockpile at all, little Jimmy still probably wouldn't have gotten a Wii the other 11 months, because those stockpiled Wiis spread out over 11 months doesn't actually add up to much more than a few extra 100k each month...not as impressive or helpful to the consumer for finding a Wii...

I used to think the stockpiling theory was bs but after thinking about it awhile it made sense and people have made many convincing arguments for it. Just in a short list - Your 250 dollar product is likely to completely deny an alternate purchase of the 350 dollar one during the time of year checkbooks are their loosest. Most will not buy both its going to be one or the other. - You need games to go with that! Third parties want to be on the systems that end up under the Christmas tree. - Free publicity. Yea I know its almost always stuff like Furby and Tickleme Elmo getting it (cue Wii is a fad bandwagon) but I know for a fact that I've seen them do stories before about the PS2 especially for games like DDR you can't deny that this helps alot. I have a good friend whose mother's only interest in the PS2 developed because of a DDR story on the view. - I'm a Nintendo fan I would have bought a Wii any time of year many people however don't consider a video game purchase outside of the holidays. This may suck you say of course it does for fans of any console but it seems a necessary evil to expand our hobby to new demographics one that we'll have to live with no matter which console maker is doing it. - This one is my own but I think it might hold true for others. Brand loyalty I don't know about others but at 21 years of age I do remember those happy Christmas mornings too get em while they are young and make them into lifetime customers. Associate your brand with that excitement of waking up Christmas morning. One of my most distinct memories is being the only child in the family who was in on the big secret of Santa. I got to help put the gifts out and saw one was the Playstation 1. My mother let me play it for an hour before my siblings but I had to return it to the box and pretend to be suprised the next morning :P . All that said I don't think its like Nintendo has 3 or 4 million Wii's stocked currently its probably more like 500-750k at the moment and will be slowly built up to 2 million or something during these slow months assuming they have more production online which I think they do even despite raw material shortages.

^ N SIXTY FOOOOOOUUUUUUUURRRRRR