Despite major hype andrecord-breaking pre-order boasts, the Nintendo 3DS did not sell out and is pretty easy to come by in most territories. Nintendo, however, is acting like a confident supervillain, saying that they had planned for this all along.
“I would characterize it as a launch where we learned significant lessons from the launch of Wii and we made sure to have not only ample supply in the marketplace, but we staged supply so it would not sell out,” said meat-fleshed president Reggie Fils-Aime. “We had product going direct to store and we also had product in retailers’ [distribution centres], so they could easily replenish when they had stores running low on inventory.
“That strategy is why you didn’t see massive sell-outs on Nintendo 3DS. Obviously, a sell-through of 400,000 units in one week is exceptional. And the fact that we achieved that without people being worried about massive stockouts and shortages just underscored how we properly executed our supply chain.”
So, Nintendo’s official line is that it meant for this to happen. In the wake of all thebad PRthe system seems to be getting, perhaps it would’ve looked better to stage some shortages and make it look like a sellout success. Doing it this way does not present a superior image.
Interview: Nintendo sold 400,000 3DS systems in first week[USA Today]
