They stake out supermarkets, department stores and electrical retailers, talking quickly and quietly on mobile phones. Currys has usurped their wife as number one on their speed-dial. They are on first-name terms with the managers at all the big shops.
And they are all after one thing: a Nintendo Wii.
Nintendo Wii - Games Console
Yes, for the second year running, Nintendo's games console is one of the must-have gifts this Christmas. And just like last year, getting your hands on one is nigh-on impossible.
The success of the Wii has taken everyone by surprise - including Nintendo itself.
"The console has far exceeded expectations in terms of sales and popularity," admits Nintendo's Rob Saunders. The Japanese games giant is working at maximum capacity to churn out 1.8 million Wiis a month but still can't keep up with demand.
The Wii has changed the gaming landscape. Even non-gamers and the elderly have been won over by its novel charms. It uses an innovative motion-sensitive controller (known as a Wiimote) to control the on-screen movement of characters.
It boasts a bulging catalogue of really clever games, such as Wii Sports, which is included with the console and allows players to wave their Wiimote like a tennis racquet or baseball bat. And then there's the price - just £180 for the console, one controller and a copy of Wii Sports. That's less than the price of an iPod.
The Wii is a victim of its own success, and the shortage has led to bands of desperate parents forming Wii squads to track down stray consoles. They swap tips on websites such as Hot UK Deals (www.hotukdeals.com), and one Wii-hunting thread on the Money Saving Expert website (www.moneysavingexpert.com) runs to 434 pages, has attracted almost 10,000 posts and been viewed more than 670,000 times.
Getting your hands on a Wii this year is difficult but not impossible, if you are committed and determined. I'm afraid it's probably also going to cost you a fair bit more than the recommended retail price. eBay (ebay.co.uk) is the obvious first port of call, with most Wiis selling at auction for around £230.
Shopping online for a Wii can certainly reduce some of the leg-work involved in trawling up and down high-streets, but you will need to be eagle-eyed and swoop on a console as soon as it becomes available. A spokesperson for Amazon said: "We sell out as soon as we put them online. People are waiting there to place an order and thousands of units sell out in less than an hour."
Several websites have sprung up to help alert you to any new Wii stock appearing online. Try Wii Preorder (www.wiipreorder.co.uk) and Wii Consoles (www.wii-consoles.co.uk). High-street retailer Game also has a stock checker at www.game.co.uk/stock.
If you plan to scour shops in person, you will need to be organised and persistent, says Martin Lewis, founder of Money Saving Expert: "You have to visit those retailers that you know receive a regular supply of fresh stock. You need to try to find out when the next delivery is going to arrive, then visit the store three times a day and cross your fingers."
Supermarkets are often unlikely Wii treasure troves. Asda receives Wiis every Thursday and these are sent on to the 60 largest stores that stock a full range of electronic goods, including Asda Living stores and supercentres. A spokesperson said that an extra 2,000 consoles are being airlifted in from Germany next week.
You could take a leaf out of Asda's book and hotfoot it across to the continent to grab a Wii. Supplies are apparently plentiful in Germany and Belgium, and they can still be found in France, although stocks in hypermarkets near ferry ports can fluctuate.
The new high-speed Eurostar rail link from St Pancras couldn't have opened at a better time and you can always fortify yourself with a glass of champagne in its famous bar before making the trek across the Channel. You can easily set the console's language to English, although you will need to buy a plug adaptor, such as the one from Maplin (tinyurl.com/yos24a).
Until recently Amazon's German website, Amazon.de, was shipping Wii consoles to the UK, but Amazon has put a temporary stop to the practice, after discovering that some customers were placing multiple orders for large numbers of consoles, presumably to sell for profit in the UK.
There is always lateral thinking. Some online mobile phone shops give away a free Wii when you buy a phone and sign up to a contract through them. Unlike some in the high street, you will need to pay a sizeable chunk towards the handset, but it could be a solution worth considering if you need a new mobile and all the other Wii avenues have dried up.
BuyMobilePhones (www.buymobilephones.net) has plenty of Wiis in stock and assures me that it is fulfilling orders. It will take about a week from placing your phone order to receiving your Wii, as you have to send back a voucher and supporting ID to claim your gift. The site posts a daily update on Wii stock levels; phones available as part of this offer include the excellent Sony Ericsson Walkman range and the touchscreen LG Viewty.
Nintendo's Rob Saunders urges customers to be patient and to speak to shops to find out when new supplies are coming in: "We're shipping stock every week to retailers in the UK. Retailers know how many consoles they will be getting in the run-up to Christmas; we're being very transparent with them. There's no smoke and mirrors. We're constantly looking at ways to speed up deliveries."
So it seems that, despite living in the internet age, parents will just have to do what generations have done before them: make friends with shopkeepers and set their alarm clocks early to join the queue. Where Christmas and popular toys are concerned, some things never change.
Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/connected/main.jhtml?xml=/connected/2007/11/29/dlwii29.xml
No comments:
Post a Comment