Hordes of holiday Wii-seekers look abroad and prepare for heartbreak.
According to a report from the Telegraph amongst others, British retailers are conceding they will not be able to meet the "unprecedented" demand for Wii as their fresh stocks, consisting of thousands of units, are exhausted within hours and even minutes of being made available.
Stock alert services have seen their websites inundated with over 100,000 visitors per day, presumably looking to avoid resorting to online auctions where one can expect to pay nearly double the £179 retail price in order to secure a system. Importing units from continental Europe, where demand for Wii appears significantly weaker than it is in the UK, is emerging as an attractive alternative to relying on eBay or retailer reservations. This was acknowledged by Nintendo UK’s Rob Saunders last week while addressing consumers’ concerns in a Q&A with the BBC, also assuring the public that Nintendo is in no way artificially constricting the supply of the console and/or manipulating its price.
This pronounced imbalance between demand and supply appears to be driven more by the UK’s extraordinary desire for Wii rather than lacklustre allocation of units, as retailers expect a "steady flow" of units and a "good level of sales" from now until Christmas. Regardless, prospective Wii purchasers may need to be much less casual about purchasing the console than they are about playing games if they are to be bowling come Boxing Day.
