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Analyst: Wii Sales Suffered from Dec. Supply

Kris Graft's picture

By Kris Graft

January 16, 2009

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"The Nintendo Wii is going through supply just as quick as they have before and these numbers merely reflect the large disparity between supply and demand."

Nintendo Wii was easily the top-selling home console in December, according to NPD Group, with 2.15 million units sold in the U.S., but that number could have been significantly higher if supply had met demand, an analyst said Friday.

Jesse Divnich with Electronic Entertainment Design and Research admitted he "missed the mark" with his 3 million-plus unit sales projection for December. However he explained, "These Wii figures are not any indication that is demand slowing down. The Nintendo Wii is going through supply just as quick as they have before and these numbers merely reflect the large disparity between supply and demand.

In November, Wii sold 2.04 million units in the U.S., and going by previous hardware trends, the console should have outperformed that figure in December by a "significant margin" if supply were up to the task, Divnich said.

"We still believe the Nintendo Wii would have sold north of 4 million units have supply and demand been in equilibrium."

OmegaVader's picture
On January 17th OmegaVader said:

Matching it's previous month is indeed usually a sign of supply restraints. It's reaching the level-cap, to say it in nerd-talk.

NickgamertagO1's picture
On January 16th NickgamertagO1 said:

Someone had said after the Wii's November numbers were so high that they thought maybe everyone who wanted to buy a Wii for Xmas tried to get it as early as they could to make sure they got one. Maybe the demand in December was a little less because so many people got the Xmas wiis in November? Just a thought. November's Wii numbers were extraordinarily high for a November month, even for the Wii.

Kenology's picture
On January 17th Kenology said:

But it's sold out everywhere, Nick. So it has to be supply constrained. If what you said was true and people got their Wiis earlier in November, wouldn't we reasonably expect December sales to be LESS than November sales, given that the mad dash took place in November instead of December?

There's really no other explanation other than the Wii being supply constrained.

Kenology's picture
On January 16th Kenology said:

The Wii had to have been supply constrained. I was expecting over 3 million units sold, but it barely beat last month's total. Keep in mind that December was a 5 week month and November was a four week month - which means Nintendo sold less Wiis per week in December than November - that just doesn't happen.

I was hoping to see the Wii break the PS2's record of 2.7 million consoles sold in a month (that happened in Dec. 2002, IIRC), but I guess we'll have to wait until next year! ;)

E. Zachary Knight's picture
On January 16th E. Zachary Knight said:

Yeah, there was a definite supply constraint. That is really the only explanation. I agree with the analysts, had there been the supply they could have easily beaten 4 million.

I think that this year we will see supply finally catching up with demand. I had originally thought maybe February or March, but it may not be till the end of the summer.