Black Friday Retail Musings
- Thread starter Jiggy
- Start date
Got Yakuza 0 and Xenoverse 2, since those were the most anime things on sale at EB. It was crowded as heck, lots of people buying consoles and asking questions about PS+/Live, so the lines were slow.
Also grabbed several manga at Chapters. Not *too* packed, thankfully. Lots of people buying blankets though. Almost did too.
Also grabbed several manga at Chapters. Not *too* packed, thankfully. Lots of people buying blankets though. Almost did too.
Switch is in its first holiday season and is a hot product. Nintendo's right to let the device just sell itself this year; next year they'll be more aggressive with deals and stuff.
Sony continues to impress me with its strategy with the PS4, though. It sounds like starting the promotions early and letting them run all week was a stroke of genius, and I can't believe people continue to doubt them. Purely business-wise, they've been pretty much red hot all generation. They know how to sell consoles damn well.
Sony continues to impress me with its strategy with the PS4, though. It sounds like starting the promotions early and letting them run all week was a stroke of genius, and I can't believe people continue to doubt them. Purely business-wise, they've been pretty much red hot all generation. They know how to sell consoles damn well.
Love reading these...mine was not very exciting...decided about 830pm that i wanted to some egg nog so I told my wife I was off to get some. She thought I was crazy. Went in to a full Walmart and saw plenty of games, TVs, and a nice Pyrex set that I picked up. Grabbed the eggnog and as I walked toward the door...I saw it...on the top of one of the shelves...The legend of Zelda Explorers Edition. It sat there like that idol from Raiders of the Lost Ark. I had to have it. I juked, spun, leaped, and sidestepped around buggies, crying babies, and slow people. And in the end, I walked out triumphantly.
My wife saw huge stacks of Switches in stores today when she was out. Not many PS4's though, as they were being scoffed up left and right. Sort of goes along with the pictures people posted earlier in the thread.
Hope both have huge holidays. The Xbox, I don't really care. With a PC, why would I?
Hope both have huge holidays. The Xbox, I don't really care. With a PC, why would I?
Just checked Walmart. I had no idea where they put their Black Friday consoles so I couldn't check. Games wise they had I think pretty much everything except for Horizon: Zero Dawn and Wolfenstein 2. Checked their normal games section and they had 1 copy of Horizon left which an employee got out and gave me the discounted price. I'm done shopping today. This was the most Black Friday shopping I've done in a long time.
I completely forgot about what the lack of a sale could mean for it during this period. But yeah, that's likely the biggest contributor. I guess we'll find out for sure next month.
They had Splatoon bundles for $400 CAD which is the regular price for the Switch without games. I believe the regular price is $480 for that bundle.
Interesting reads here. I wonder with the ps4 selling out if Sony dropped the ball here with their supply. Or maybe it was intentional and they didn't want to supply too many given the sales price. When does the sales price end? Maybe we'll see a big restock after that.
I'm surprised at how many switches nintendo was able to get to retailers for black Friday. Their supply issues obviously haven't been fixed, but I wonder if they'll be able to keep supply steady in the states through the holidays.
I'm surprised at how many switches nintendo was able to get to retailers for black Friday. Their supply issues obviously haven't been fixed, but I wonder if they'll be able to keep supply steady in the states through the holidays.
Or I don't know, maybe Nintendo shipped a ton more. All indicators point to Nintendo shipping up to 8M switches in the next 5 months on top of the 8M they already sold.
the switch will attract third-parties in japan that were on the 3ds or ps4/vita train (mainly vita) because the switch is the logical progression of the handheld userbase over there. it will get and already has indies, as well as western games that are geared towards everyone. its lineup basically includes what you'd see on the vita, wii u, and 3ds combined, and that's a pretty good recipe for variety and consistency. the only thing its missing are the really big franchise titles, but i don't think it's at all necessary to keep the switch going. it can exist with its own, different kind of userbase, and its owners love to play games out of it, to the point where they turn things that shouldn't be successful into relative mega-successes. like with ps4, this is a sort of thing that doesn't just die down. it's going to only get stronger as the system becomes cheaper, with more games, and there are additional options for playing (ie switch mini or 'new' switch skus).
Is it just the bare bones 1TB that is selling out? I was at a few more stores today and decided to take a look at stock and I couldn't find any of those but plenty Battlefront and WW2 bundles everywhere. Granted this is all anecdotal but I'm wondering how many 1TB bare bones consoles were actually out there?
If the PS4 slim 1TB was plentiful and still sold out, does this signal the end of the pack in and that base price is king once again?
I mean, it's nice to wish every console manufacturer good luck during the Holidays regardless?
If the PS4 slim 1TB was plentiful and still sold out, does this signal the end of the pack in and that base price is king once again?
I mean, it's nice to wish every console manufacturer good luck during the Holidays regardless?
My retail report is from a Best Buy which I was at on Wednesday night picking up a new headset. While I was there I was able to take a rough count of what they had stacked out and I was back at the Store today (Friday) at around 1pm. PS4 Standard without question looked to be the best selling. They had about 60-70 units on Wednesday and Zero today. The big loser at this Store was both the PS4 Pro and shockingly to me the Switch. Both of these stacks looked almost identical to what they looked Wednesday night. With the Pro looking to have the same 40+ units and the Switch having about 50 units. Not saying none sold, but those 2 stacks looked identical. The Xbox One S looked to be moving, but they also had various versions stacked out. I would say from the stacks before and after a good 30-40 units less than the count before. The Xbox One X which had a stack of about 50 or so was down to about 20 or so left, but while I was in line buying a few things I saw about 5 just in the line and few Xbox One S. Since they were out of the PS4's, the Switch and PRO's looked to be not moving in the hour so we were in the Store today.
A far as software a lot of traffic in both the Xbox One and PS4 sections, plus most of the bins had mainly PS4 and Xbox One games, tons of games being sold and seen people with stacks of games walking around. The Switch section by comparison looked like no one was shopping that aisle.
Overall, looks like the standard PS4 was huge followed by the combination of Xbox One S/X. What really blew me away was the amount of Swtich units and this goes with what a lot of other people here in the thread are posting. That was the most shocking thing to me from the posts and what I saw.
A far as software a lot of traffic in both the Xbox One and PS4 sections, plus most of the bins had mainly PS4 and Xbox One games, tons of games being sold and seen people with stacks of games walking around. The Switch section by comparison looked like no one was shopping that aisle.
Overall, looks like the standard PS4 was huge followed by the combination of Xbox One S/X. What really blew me away was the amount of Swtich units and this goes with what a lot of other people here in the thread are posting. That was the most shocking thing to me from the posts and what I saw.
Pretty much. Like, $150 bucks will get you a shit ton of high quality AAA games. Super appealing.
Bad luck on Sony with that marketing deal for battlefront 2. They must have spent tons to have ads play constantly the last few weeks and yet there are piles of cheap battlefront PS4 bundles being untouched. I wonder if they'll be sonys before Christmas special this year. really need to move those units since they waste retail space.
Aren't BF2 bundles full priced? I don't think they're discounted.
Should have mentioned I'm in Canada. Its one of the bundle deals here.
From what I've been reading in this thread and elsewhere, what's more likely is what you're seeing with the switch is restocks. Best buy had a ton in stock and kept moving units from the back as the units were depleted. Nintendo outdid themselves with supply for black Friday and have been able to keep stores stocked, even with the demand.
It's unlikely that it's priced lower in Canada than in the USA.
Usually these bundle deals are signed with the publisher at a fixed price so the publisher receives X dollars off the retail face price. It may restrict Sony from pricing it down without consent.
Note that in Sony's latest financial report, they were doing better than expected with higher profits than projected especially so for gaming. In the report they said they would push down the profit margins in order to have more aggressive sales for their console business over the holidays, so some of the deals you see now may be pretty last minute.
Because of that I do expect a 199 PS4 deal in December as well as other aggressive pricing on 1st party software.
While SNE has been pursuing profits the past 3 years, I think they're still mindful of the momentum of Switch and XOX, so being sales unit king over this Q4 can maintain their mindshare dominance going into 2018. Also, sets up the install base for a couple of key titles next year perfectly.
Demand for Switch should be steady, with a bit of a boost. Its products aren't heavily discounted so there isn't a huge demand multiplier spike.
The spike for Wii happened even without price movement because even grandpas and grandmas were buying it. Switch is great but isn't lightning in a bottle.
Nintendo is not struggling with demand this Black Friday. In fact it will struggle more OUTSIFE of the sales windows of Q4 because that's when comparative pricing of alternative consoles will be closer.
Naw, it's just a system that isn't discounted at all. There is no real reason for it to move crazy units during Black Friday. This is the first holiday so it's fine that it isn't but PS4 and Xbox One will be the big winners this holiday.
I think it's fair to say all will win. Christmas shopping season has begun. Switches will move at an even more rapid pace now
There are a lot of FIFAs not being touched around here.
Destiny 2 for PS4, however, is almost nowhere to be seen.
Destiny 2 for PS4, however, is almost nowhere to be seen.
Spent a lot of my time in the PC part deal area today, it didn't reach last year's level on much of anything but monitor sales.
The state of building PCs is at its worse if the gpu I got last year (1060 3gb ie the most market saturated card) was at its lowest $40 more expensive than last year.
Got a real nice ryzen 1700x deal from a 3rd party vendor on amazon 3 days before black friday, I knew it wasn't dropping lower and I was right.
The state of building PCs is at its worse if the gpu I got last year (1060 3gb ie the most market saturated card) was at its lowest $40 more expensive than last year.
Got a real nice ryzen 1700x deal from a 3rd party vendor on amazon 3 days before black friday, I knew it wasn't dropping lower and I was right.
Plenty of X1X and S here, standard PS4 we're gone entirely, Pro's we're low on stock as well. Switches were everywhere...
I wonder is Sony purposely shipped so little and maybe MS is really selling more of everything, it's just that they shipped so much that it seems like no one wants it.
I wonder is Sony purposely shipped so little and maybe MS is really selling more of everything, it's just that they shipped so much that it seems like no one wants it.
I find this whole "it's gonna be a great holiday for all 3!" nonsense to be kind of funny. I bet all 3 would love to come out on top, having stacks of your console sitting pretty at retail stores is not something you'd want.
This just reaffirms my belief that Pro is completely unneccesary as a device. Base ps4 is destroying at that impulse buy pricepoint, i didn't actually think it would sell out even though i thought it would do well.
If Sony had replaced the PS4 Pro stock with slim stock, they could have sold even more. instead they have too much pro stock lying around that nobody wants to buy :( so sad for them lmao
If Sony had replaced the PS4 Pro stock with slim stock, they could have sold even more. instead they have too much pro stock lying around that nobody wants to buy :( so sad for them lmao
When the Switch was low on stock and sold out people were saying Nintendo was screwing up by not having heaps available in droves (even though the reason for the shortages were known).
Now that there is plentiful supply going up to the holidays it suddenly stopped and Nintendo overstocked.
Even when it's being reported otherwise. Smh
Now that there is plentiful supply going up to the holidays it suddenly stopped and Nintendo overstocked.
Even when it's being reported otherwise. Smh
You guys with your 20 dollar Disgaeas. I have so much envy. (Lowest in Cannuckistan was $54, IIRC)
Are you implying Nintendo isn't going to be happy with sales this holiday season?
I don't know if nintendo will "win" November NPD (probably not tbh) but launching in March instead of the holiday seems to have let them build up quite a lot of stock.
Stores always put out what they have so if there are stacks of systems, all it means is they're not selling out what they have, not that they're not selling really well.
Yep, they overstocked our store with the Pro, and understocked the Slim, but did have several people trade in their regular PS4s towards a Pro upgrade.
What was the price point for the Pro?
In Germany they had several retailers/online shops offering it for 283€, so if you got by the logic of consoles prices it would be 283$.
White version was sold out pretty damn fast online. Standard version followed and both Amazon and MediaMarkt (biggest electronic retailer that also got an online shop here), only got the bundle versions left for 340€.
Yes. Yes he is. He has posted countless times about how positive switch threads upset him.
I think Nintendo killed his dog?