Couldn't Preorder? Don't worry!

teqguy

WiiChat Member
Oct 2, 2006
144
1
California
Despite what seems to be an overly excessive amount of hype over Wii preorders, it has come to my attention that very few people actually understand the procedure of a preorder.

If I'm reading the sentiment correctly, what's on the forefront of people's minds breaks down as such:

90% - Were not able to preorder but are at least mildly concerned about aquiring a system at launch

9% - Do not care about preorders and are just looking forward to camping out at launch

1% - Have aquired a preorder and are still anxious about getting one at launch


Although there's a pretty wide margin between the three categories, allow me to express to you that the feelings are unanimous: We're all anxious- just some less than others and some for other reasons.


I'll start off by explaining that where I derrive this insight from is directly in the heart of the beast; I am in that slim percentile of people who was lucky enough to preorder this morning.

The haves and have nots show a flagrant distinction around the time of the latest "must have" release, but for some, the "must have" attitude lands you a place at the front of the line- at 6:30PM yesterday(the sad and mildly whimsical part of this is that second, third, fourth, and fifth arrived a good ten hours later).

Arriving at 6:30 AM, I happened to be tenth in line with a clipboard numbered to ten being passed around, so needless to say, you can understand my mindset at that point.

Eleven, twelve, thirteen, and fourteen(one of which being of the lucky few to attend E3) behind me were turned away, with those standing breathing a sigh of relief. The difference between their arrival and mine was an hour, giving you a figure of what to expect at launch(to stay on the safe side, halve it twice and those are the kind of arrival times you should be apprehensive about).


Now, while those like me are busy kissing their reciepts and dancing around their residences/offices/schools/etc, I'll bring everyone back to reality.

Hopefully this will benefit that 90% of you that were disappointed:


While GameStop/EBGames and probably every other store recommends that you preorder to ensure you can buy a console on launch day, they cannot reserve a system for you.

The only function of a preorder is that it gives corporate a ballpark amount of how many units to ship to a certain store. This doesn't guarantee that your preorder won't become someone else's launch day purchase.

For example, if a store only gets one preorder for an item(as is the case with really crappy games), corporate will only send one additional copy of that game, making the count X + 1, where X is their original bulk amount.

The manager at the store I went to expressed deep concern about the XBox 360 fiasco and Ebayers, hence limiting their preorders to 10 people at one per household. Furthermore, GameStop's new policy entails browsing Ebay to look for anyone selling their preorders. Anyone caught will have their preorder cancelled. He went on to say that only he and an employee were purchasing a Wii, bringing their store total to X + 12.

This does not shed any light on how many units they are or aren't expecting. Just because their liability is limited to 10 people, doesn't mean they aren't already expecting double, triple, or quadruple that.

Nintendo intends to have 2 million units at launch, which means their worst case scenario is near or beyond 2 million, give or take a hundred. If you do the math, it turns out that there will probably be 200,000 consoles for Canada and some regions of Mexico, leaving 1.8 million consoles for the United States.

Halve that to find out how many consoles will be divided among video game stores(GameStop/EBGames, GameCrazy, etc). The rest will go to your Targets, Walmarts, Toys R Us', etc. This leaves 900,000 units for each.

If you figure that there are 4,400 GameStop/EBGames locations and only 700 GameCrazy locations, the worst case scenario would be between 20 and 50 consoles per store, with our best odds being 100+ per store per hundred miles.


With that, I urge you not to be concerned, because I have a strong suspicion that this will be one launch where the majority of the units are bought from store shelves, not Ebay, nor the trunk of someone's car.

Good luck on launch.
 
Thank you for explaining that. I am also one of the lucky 1% to get a pre-order, but I have a few friends on here that are worried about getting the Wii. I ensured them one by the end of the year definately, because that is true, but a slim chance on getting it on launch day. But as you said, there are plenty to go around. =)
 
Demon Slayer said:
Oh Come on thats not alot i mean we have 35 million ppl in canada...thats not fair

But are all of them people who want/know about the Wii? That limits it to maybe 5 million... >_> If that helps...
 
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Demon Slayer said:
Oh Come on thats not alot i mean we have 35 million ppl in canada...thats not fair

Yeah, but 25% of them speak French, so who cares?:lol:

But to be honest, if Nintendo ramps up its yields like they've indicated they will, 200,000 consoles could easily double to 400,000 within a month.

I doubt there will be a shortage, especially considering the US is just a hop, skip, and a jump away.
 
teqguy said:
Yeah, but 25% of them speak French, so who cares?:lol:

But to be honest, if Nintendo ramps up its yields like they've indicated they will, 200,000 consoles could easily double to 400,000 within a month.

I doubt there will be a shortage, especially considering the US is just a hop, skip, and a jump away.

The hop is free, but the skip and the jump cost a pretty penny. ;)
 
teqguy said:
Yeah, but 25% of them speak French, so who cares?:lol:

But to be honest, if Nintendo ramps up its yields like they've indicated they will, 200,000 consoles could easily double to 400,000 within a month.

I doubt there will be a shortage, especially considering the US is just a hop, skip, and a jump away.
Ok i know the french arn't that great but thats just rude ( i am french you know)
 
Demon Slayer said:
Ok i know the french arn't that great but thats just rude ( i am french you know)

Je jouer au joue video!

(Dunno if I said that right...)
 
Jenova said:
Je jouer au joue video!

(Dunno if I said that right...)
Je joue au jeux video...lol...almost..dosn't matter what does matter is me getting that Wii
 
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Jenova said:
The hop is free, but the skip and the jump cost a pretty penny.

Luckily Nintendo fans know no bounds.

Demon Slayer said:
Ok i know the french arn't that great but thats just rude ( i am french you know)

Just poking a little fun.

Out of curiosity, what language will you be playing the majority of your games in?
 
teqguy said:
Luckily Nintendo fans know no bounds.



Just poking a little fun.

Out of curiosity, what language will you be playing the majority of your games in?
ENGLISH lol im an acadien and back here acadiens speek french and english togetter...we call tah chiak..lol example...Ej vien Right Back ( which is baicicly BrB the Ej is Je like I

anyway i love english way more then french thank you lol
i never watch french movies anyway...its always in english...to tell you the thruth i can hardly understand what ppl are saying in french movies
 
The only function of a preorder is that it gives corporate a ballpark amount of how many units to ship to a certain store. This doesn't guarantee that your preorder won't become someone else's launch day purchase.

On the contrary, the pre-order reserves our spot in line, it says so on the slip they all gave us when we put our pre-order down. Which means whichever systems come in first, we will be the first to be given the opportunity to buy them. This will be so until all pre-orders are filled. Then afterwards, those who did not pre-order will be allowed a chance to buy them.

The only thing not guaranteed to us is that we may not exactly receive it on the launch date, in the case that they do not receive enough to fill the pre-order quota.
 
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Demon Slayer said:
ENGLISH lol im an acadien and back here acadiens speek french and english togetter...we call tah chiak..lol example...Ej vien Right Back ( which is baicicly BrB the Ej is Je like I

Sounds interesting.

I don't know if you're familiar with Malaysians and Singaporeans, but they have a dialect that combines Mandarin and English that they call Singlish.

It involves excessive use of the word "lah" in every sentence, which to this day I still have no idea the meaning of.

If you ever get a chance, it's quite a spectacle to read/listen to... and you can't help but say they resemble the way an alien from Mars Attacks speaks.
 
teqguy said:
If you ever get a chance, it's quite a spectacle to read/listen to... and you can't help but say they resemble the way an alien from Mars Attacks speaks.
lol must be intresting
 
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Ryouko said:
On the contrary, the pre-order reserves our spot in line, it says so on the slip they all gave us when we put our pre-order down. Which means whichever systems come in first, we will be the first to be given the opportunity to buy them. This will be so until all pre-orders are filled. Then afterwards, those who did not pre-order will be allowed a chance to buy them.

The only thing not guaranteed to us is that we may not exactly receive it on the launch date, in the case that they do not receive enough to fill the pre-order quota.

Not true.

If you read their disclaimer on their website, in addition to the memo that was passed around a few days ago, you would've read that the launch is still a first come, first serve basis.

As I stated, the only purpose for a preorder is securing an ADDITIONAL console that will be added into their current quotas.

If your GameStop/EB is operating this way, I congratulate you on choosing the right one, but the one I went to specified that we'd still have to be at each others' throats at launch.

I could be misinterpreting both the memo and disclaimer, but I can't get past the manager's opening statement.
 

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