DecoReturns
Member
So Mario Kart Deluxe sold over half a Mil in just April?
That's pretty damn good.
That's pretty damn good.
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Nintendo Switch Was the Best-Selling Video Game System in April; Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
- Thread starter ggx2ac
- Start date
No, only two days of April because the cut off date for NPD was April 29th.
How? factories can't just produce millions of them within a few weeks.
This really puts things in perspective. It's amazing that it's doing this well even with the supply constraints.
Sword Of Doom
Member
I saw three switches at my local Best Buy yesterday on top of the cages where they keep videogames behind the cashiers
Orniletter
Banned
It's great that a couple of stores in Italy have plenty of stock, but Switch is absolutely not readily available all over Europe.
France and Germany in particular are virtually sold out. And just because something is "carried" by Amazon doesn't mean you can actually order one.
Skittzo0413
Member
I will admit that I have no idea how this works but I'm just trying to logically deduce what is the most likely/cost effective solution for a console maker.
What happens if demand doesn't slow down before November? They have to drastically yet temporarily ramp up their production in the preceding months if they're not holding back any stock right now. That seems like a fairly risky and expensive proposition, especially for a conservative company like Nintendo.
But again I'll admit that I have no business experience and no idea what actually happens, so you guys could very well be right.
Games4Days00
Member
Glad to see it doing well! I really look forward to buying one myself as more games are released. Really looking forward to Zelda, hate feeling like I'm missing out.
UK is sold out as well. Still hard to find, and this market usually isn't kind to Nintendo. It's a success.
Astral Dog
Member
The Wii U never had this month.
Savor it
Savor it
So it sold better than everything other than DS in the first two months? And in 2 months, has already sold more than 3DS in 6 months and only 1k less than Wii U's first six months.
Pretty great numbers so far.
Damn two days and over 500k
They probably are, but to a small degree. Much like any manufacturer, holidays represents a particular time period that they need additional stock due to heavy demand, but also a period where people are more likely to pass on buying your product for something else if they can't get it. Comparatively something being a little hard to find during the normal calendar is not as bad, becauae the consumer is more willing to wait and find one, rather than buy something else.
Having said that, Nintendo makes their revenue from software, so it's unlikely they would intentionally hold back any large amount of stock when they need to much as many as possible to sell software now, and during the holiday season.
As far the artificial shortage comments go, I feel like thats something that only truly works for monopolies or companies that have minimal competition. Like pharmaceuticals for example. While some companies may hold back a bit of stock for products to help drive some news stories or save product for the holidays, in the end they are probably producing as much as they can without overshooting demand. Someone mentioned toy companies earlier, and it's especially true for them, because toy popularity does not last very long, so overshooting would be terrible.
Astral Dog
Member
I think Nintendo has a problem in quality control (like the joystick issues) they are fixing slowly rather than up production and risk bad pr
dragonyeuw
Member
MK8D launched on April 28th. So that's half a million for 3 days, I'm guessing it would sell triple that amount with the benefit of a full month. I wouldn't expect less than half the current WW install base to pick that title up.
Gotdatmoney
Member
There wont even be 1.5 million Switches sold in the US yet including May. It would have zero chance of tripling those numbers with a full month.
2 days. NPD only tracked until April 29th
Swimmer9800
Member
Man am I happy I stood out in the cold for my switch
Kageshinzo
Member
Manufacturing consumer products is all about reading the market and predicting initial stock and production based from preliminary research. If demand happens to be way more than supply, you have no choice but to ramp up production, again predicting how much the increase would be, exactly like what Nintendo is doing now. It's not going to be risky if their prediction is more or less correct, but even with the current demand, I would assume they would rather err on the side of caution and still be conservative. It's much better to come short on demand rather than oversupply and incur added expense storing unsold stocks.
Skittzo0413
Member
Yeah this is what I would think too. Something like 0.5-1% of every production lot being held back in order to have a lot more to ship in the holiday season without having to temporarily ramp up production just for the holidays. Like I said above, it's only speculation though, I have no idea if this happens.
Same! Well worth it.
It's very simple, if we go by the WSJ rumour where they planned to increase production from 8M to 16M for the FY then, that is what will be produced regardless of demand.
They did that change because they expected that 8M produced wouldn't be enough to fulfill demand. If they still don't fulfill demand by November with production now being 16M. Then it just means they underestimated demand again.
They lose sales that's it. They just predicted things wrong, they could still increase production further if they think 16M won't be enough assuming demand is still outstripping supply but that choice would have to be made around July/August to prepare for holidays.
The reason they couldn't do this in the first place is obviously they didn't know how it would perform, once they see by July/August how shipments are going, they could do more than 16M if they have to because the fact is the product just launched and it will experience growth in the following year which is what normally happens in the product life cycle so they'd have to increase production again.
I do not think this clicks with a lot of people. The only thing Nintendo really dropped the ball on here was the initial demand. However, the initial demand is irrelevant, as these tend to sell out anyway within the first few days (if the console is successful), then supply constraints occur anyway; basically where they are now.
No console manufacturer is going to make 10 million consoles to prep for launch day/year, and then just sit on them as they sell them by the month. The crazy thing is, there are people who suggest this crazy idea. It's a money waster. And like you said, all Nintendo can do is amp up production, which takes time to actually see the results.
Skittzo0413
Member
I guess the question I have about their production capacity is, do they basically produce X amount per day and stay at that rate throughout the entire fiscal year? Or is there a production schedule put forth in March (or earlier) which has their factories producing X amount per month between March and August and 2 to 3X amount per month from September to November (numbers and months just for this example)?
It would seem to me that producing X amount a day steadily for the entire year would be far cheaper than opening up new production lines at certain times of the year, especially when many companies will be opening up such lines before the holiday season so there will be competition among the various manufacturers and factories.
EDIT: And I'm not questioning their pre-launch strategy or saying they should be selling more/producing more (though they should, which is why they correctly doubled their production), I'm just trying to figure out the most likely way they would be preparing for the holiday season, and how that could be affecting their current stock.
Unfortunately, I wouldn't know those kind of details.
cubicle47b
Member
8 million units per year is 667K units per month. It may take 2-4 months to double production to 16 million units per year. The Switch may be supply constrained for another 8-10 months.
Maintenance
Member
Most fans are fucking nuts.
Yeah, it's good to notice that the current sales numbers, equating to roughly 750k worldwide, are in line with the initial 8 million a year production plans. What they have shipped in April seems to be what they could produce in one month, instead of a production of multiple months as March was. Once they manage to get the increased production up and running, this monthly number should increase (significantly), and from there the monthly shipment numbers should go up by a lot (assuming they are doubling the production plans as WSJ reported).
While I do agree they are a toy company, that's irrelevant to this conversation. What matters is the business model (which is base on software sold). Especially as they move on to subscription online stuff, the more consoles they have in the wild the better.
One thing that I don't think has been factored is that Switch was probably rushed out to make up for the Wii U. If they could've had 5+ years of Wii U, I think Nintendo would've preferred that.
So everything has probably been last minute (you can see it in the bare-bones OS, no VC, etc), and I assume this could've had an impact on production, properly gauging the market, and so on.
So everything has probably been last minute (you can see it in the bare-bones OS, no VC, etc), and I assume this could've had an impact on production, properly gauging the market, and so on.
dragonyeuw
Member
It sold 1/3 of that in 2 days on a new console with owners salivating for new content, with no other really major releases this month. Bookmark this post for end of May and I'll happily eat crow if I'm wrong. If it doesn't make 1.5, it'll come damn close.
Cool, even better then.
Lord Azrael
Member
Did you understand what s/he said? You are predicting an attach rate of over 100%. It's not happening.
kitchenmotors
Banned
Dude it's on Amazon right now.
Wasnt on Amazon when i wanted one a month ago.
Skittzo0413
Member
The install base needs to grow a bit first. Software launches are typically front-loaded too, although to a lesser extent with Nintendo games. I'd say 1 million in the US as of the end of May is pretty ambitious but also possible. 1.5m would probably be over 100% attach rate.
Bronetta
Ask me about the moon landing or the temperature at which jet fuel burns. You may be surprised at what you learn.
Maybe they think it'll pull a Zelda with 100% attach rate.
sleepnaught
Member
Hope they can ramp up production, especially with E3 coming up.
James Scott
Banned
Just sold out, lol
Japanmanx3
Member
Much deserved. Well done.
Good to hear, both as a Switch owner and as a Nintendo fan who has fared the heavy weather for the past few generations. It's damn refreshing to see people embrace a Nintendo system again for the first time in a while (I'm talking like, casual gamers here) and I really do hope it's successful. Not just because I'm a Nintendo fan for life, but because (obviously) the better it sells, the more games will come to it!
xDUMPWEEDx
Banned
While I have yet to see a Switch in-store, I would fully expect that by the day Mario launches that there will be plenty on the shelves for it.
Neff
Member
I honestly think some people genuinely refuse to believe this thing is taking off.
dragonyeuw
Member
The confusion is because in my earlier post I referenced half of WW sales, when the topic of the thread is US based sales. But to be clear, I'm saying I expect WW sales of this game to approach half of the WW console install base in a month. So, take whatever that number is and do the math from there. I am NOT saying 1.5 million sales will occur in the US during the first month.