Wii sales crash in Japan, Nintendo raises price in UK
If you were a manufacturer of electrical items and your product had started showing signs of tailing off in sales, would you A. Drop the price in order to give the product a boost? Or B. Raise the price and risk making the decline in sales accelerate? Nintendo has chosen the latter option for the Wii.
The Nintendo Wii was launched at a very reasonable price and has stayed there ever since. This has no doubt helped it sell in the huge quantities it has done as parents are put off spending a fortune on a console for the family.
There are now signs that sales of the Wii are faltering, although it’s far from being beaten by either the Xbox 360 or PS3 in worldwide figures. In Japan though, usually the territory which leads gaming trends with others following in its wake, the Wii is experiencing a definite bump in the road.
Over the last two weeks, the Wii has been beaten by both of its competitors in Japan. This is mainly due to Resident Evil bundles being released for both the PS3 and Xbox 360, but it still shows a trend towards the Wii going down in its home territory. This is probably due to it having reached a certain level of market saturation.
Faced with a drop off in sales, manufacturers would usually announce a price drop in order to ignite interest and invoke another burst of sales. Bizarrely, however, Nintendo is actually raising the price of the Wii, at least in the UK.
According to TechRadar, Nintendo is taking the decision to raise the price it sells the console to British retailers due to “extreme currency fluctuations.” Basically, since the Wii was launched, the pound has depreciated massively against the yen meaning the money Nintendo makes on each console sold has dropped.
The Wii currently sells for £179.99 in the UK, but this is expected to rise to nearer £200 come April 1. Big retailers and supermarkets are likely to take the hit themselves, but smaller retailers will likely have no choice other than to pass the price hike on to customers.
I suppose it could be worse though. The PS3 is still retailing for almost £300 in the UK, and Sony seems insistent on keeping the price of its console high. Then again, there is a vast difference in quality between the PS3 and Wii. In my opinion. Obviously.
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26 Responses to “Wii sales crash in Japan, Nintendo raises price in UK”
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March 17th, 2009
i actually played my wii on the weekend… for every gutterball/throw without hitting a pin u did a shot, at end of game… 1st did no shots, 2nd 2 shots, 3rd 4 shots… and 4th a mega 8 shots… and 3rd n 4th were out for others to come in
March 17th, 2009
I am with DAVE PARRACK, I don’t really like the Wii. Clumsy controls, games aimed primarily at kids with the exception of a few, SD graphics, no slot to put my penis in, it’s just an awful machine.
March 17th, 2009
Harry, you’re going to love The Chuck Norris when it comes out. It has plenty of slots to put your penis in… if you feel the need.
March 17th, 2009
Don’t worry about Wii, sales momentum like is experiencing is the sticky stuff of Sony and Microsoft’s wettest of wet dreams.
March 17th, 2009
Dave Parrack: The boy that cried wolf.
March 17th, 2009
1 very predicable sales spike for the others on the back of a big name franchise and suddenly it’s all over for the Wii!?
Jeez, give it a rest.
Besides Japan is representative of nothing but Japan.
It’s an odd-ball market all to its self, always has been and always will be.
As for the price stuff?
The fall of the $, £ & € against the Yen is crippling anything Japanese outside of Japan.
It’s why you won’t be seeing a PS3 pricecut any time soon.
(it’s why lots of CE products could well see pricves rising – HD TVs are reported as showing this too)
March 17th, 2009
Ha finally the Wii is dying, about time.
March 17th, 2009
The only thing I can see, is the wii getting slightly closer to its saturation point. At what point does everyone that wants one simply own it?
March 17th, 2009
If the PS2 is anything to go by sometime around them hitting the 120 million level.
They haven’t even started cutting the price of it yet (and given the tech surely even with a strong Yen they have room to do so?).
March 17th, 2009
they also haven’t released zelda wii yet and don’t forget the release of motion+ and wii sports resort.
March 17th, 2009
Could be that the Wii has finally hit market saturation…. Or it could be the lack of quality games over the course of the last year… or it could also be that the Wii has no quality games due to arrive in the foreseeable future. I think the fad is finally starting to wear off and people are starting to realize that the Wii has really nothing to offer.
March 17th, 2009
[walks out into the street and kicks a Wii]
We won! We won! The war is over!
March 17th, 2009
When the NDP #’s drop you will all see that Nintendo will still be on top.
March 17th, 2009
Unfortunately you’re probably right… but what have these people been playing over the course of the last 9 months? Wii Fit and Mario Kart?
I was so close to buying a Wii at one point, but looking back at it, I’m so happy I didn’t waste the $250 and feed into this madness. If I had bought one, I would have felt incredibly cheated by Nintendo’s lack of first party support.
March 17th, 2009
“they also haven’t released zelda wii yet”
………..o rly??
Barnabe, I think you mean lack of THIRD party support. The first party stuff is all the Wii has going for it.
-Arvis
March 17th, 2009
zelda twilight princess is a gamecube game.. and nintendo already announced that a zelda wii game and a possible new mario galaxy game is already in development now..
March 18th, 2009
Dave, I don’t know. The thought of inserting my penis into ‘Chuck Norris’ sounds a little risky. He could pull a Mr T, clinch his butt cheeks and rip my dick off.
March 18th, 2009
As long as they mix it up a little with a new Zelda game I am down with it.
For a company that preached about stales unchanging games, Nintendo is quite guilty of reusing old ideas or making %90 clones of previous games. E.g. TP was just majoras mask, which was oot, combined with lttp (dual world).
They need to add more progression based things which aren’t the same old items, side quests for items and more exploration aka wind waker. I doubt its going to happen and I believe we will get a TP-2 type of a game without the wolf thing.
March 18th, 2009
Such is life in our world of currency fluctuations.
So in USA Wii sells for 5/8 the price of PS3, so £300 would equal £187.50. So what’s the big deal?
March 18th, 2009
Steady harry.
You’re starting to sound too much like dwh there you know.
March 18th, 2009
They’re merging into one being.
March 18th, 2009
“They’re merging into one being.”
Sounds disgusting.
-Arvis
March 18th, 2009
He’ll never be as good looking as me.
March 18th, 2009
Never.
March 19th, 2009
Harry, everyone here thinks you look like Richard Simmons.
-Arvis
March 20th, 2009
Richard Simmons is a very attractive man.