Topic: Spy-gotten Secret Wii Retail Pics! Shelves, Controller Gloves, Bags... DOG TAGS?!?!

[Kairon]

Engadget has the goods!

Dude... those controller gloves look SLICK... packages of three, either a red/blue/pink or green/black/silver? ... The latter is just drab enough to be my style! I'm actually considering accessorizing my Wii!!!! ...ARGH NINTENDO STOP TURNING ME INTO UBER CONSUMER!!!

... god... they've even got me considering buying Wii DOGTAGS... and I don't even know what I'd do with them!

~Carmine M. Red
Kairon@aol.com

[BigJim]

Nice find, interesting toys.

[BlkPaladin]

Well for those worring about the virtual console there was some good news from that in the mark up list there is the Points Card that is used to buy content.

[Bill Aurion]

One of those dogtags is totally mine!

[Ceric]

One of those green gloves is totally mine! (I recently saw something similar on a 360 controller, held it, and promptly asked if they made some for the Wavebird as well.  They didn't so I'm happy to see it for the Wii, I have greasy hands.  Now I just have to find the little lanyard thinging to go on it.  I have a Winnie the Pooh in a Hamster suit for my DS.)

The Wii only roughly has a 5% markup for retailers.  Is that normal on consoles?

I'll have to see the dogtags and the lapel pins in person.

[stevey]

How many points will their be in a point card if nintendo only making $17 on each one? And I really like the idea of dog-tags, especially when I bring over my $60 controller to a friend house and dont want them mix up....  

[WuTangTurtle]

I wonder if they could plz make a translucent wiimote glove, and is it me or is that a wiimote stand....no more laying the controllers for everyone to step on.

[Kairon]

Yeah, typically retailers make SQUAT on actual hardware sales. Thus the advent of forcing consumers to buy bundles so the retailer can make some assured profit.

Interesting here is that the Wii is sold to retailers at around $235... I wonder how much of that is profit for Nintendo if any? And if the Nunchuck and VC controllers are sold to retailers for $14.50, my oh my that's a ton of profit for Nintendo for those cheap motion sensors, an analog stick, wires, plastic, and two buttons... please drop your cost-to-retailer price  so you can drop at least the nunchuck's price to $15 MSRP and don't make so much profit plz!

~Carmine M. Red
Kairon@aol.com

[Caliban]

I read your posts before I saw the pics and I actually thought they would have hand gloves lol...so it's basically a controller skin, cool, if they had them selling individually I would get 2 black controller gloves, now if only they had Wii skins.  

[UncleBob]

You guys know this is the kind of stuff I live for, right?

Anywhoo, I wonder if these dog tags are of a nice metal that you could take to your local Wal*Mart (or such) and get them engraved...

[King of Twitch]

It seems the PS3 would need the dog tags, as it is going to be massacred this holiday. Also I hope I can buy Wii points in increments other than 24.99.

[BlkPaladin]

I suspect that it will be about $20/25 worth of points, since I expect since you can buy them online, Nintendo will be willing to take a cut just to get a person hooked.

[KDR_11k]

I'd say we'll get points according to the final price, not the price to retailers. After all the customer doesn't give a damn how much of the money actually went to Nintendo, they only know how much they're paying.

[wandering]

It's hard not to think, looking at these pictures, that the Wii will be a huge success. The virtual boy didn't have no dog tags!

Quote
I actually thought they would have hand gloves lol.

Yeah, me too.

[GoldenPhoenix]

Any of you guys know about how much stores make off the games? I've always wondered that, anyway those goodies look pretty neat, I may have to pick some up!

[Michael8983]

Do the controller gloves imply that there may be just one STANDARD white remote as opposed to the multitude of colors we were expecting?

Also, what, if any, other games have been announced for launch?
I seriously hope it's not JUST those three.

[GoldenPhoenix]

I believe the announced games so far for launch are:

Rayman
Excite Truck
Legend of Zelda
Red Steel

Ones that I'm not sure about:
Elebits
Madden
FarCry
GT
Call of Duty 3
Marvel Alliance

About the Wiimote colors, I have no idea.

[Kairon]

Nintendo's actually still holding a lot of information back, like the exact day one launch lineup, or the virtual console line-up, etc.

And I want to go back to the consoleprice to retailers: retailers are making more than 10 bucks off of every system sold... If the XBox 360 and PS3 are sold to retailers at MSRP (hence no profit at all) and the Wii is sold at lower than MSRP (hence actual profit), could this be Nintendo giving retailers an incentive to carry and push Nintendo systems?

~Carmine M. Red
Kairon@aol.com

[Caterkiller]

Awesome. I am really excited for the controller skins! During my main Gamecube days, my brother, sister, and I each had our own wavebirds. And so we wouldn't mix them up, I put these little Pokemon elemental stickers on them I got years ago when Gold and Silver came out. We wont look like losers any more who just had to make due with crummy stickers. Now we'll look like losers with cool controllers!  

[WindyMan]

Quote

WII CONSOLE - 249.99 / 237.50
WII REMOTE CONTROLL - 39.99 / 32.00
WII POINTS CARD - 24.99 / 17.00
WII CLASSIC CONTROLLER - 19.99 / 14.50
WII NUNCHUK CONTROLLER - 19.99 / 14.50
WII GPAK ORGANIZER&TRAVEL - 29.99 / 18.95
WII RAYMAN RAVING RABIDS - 49.99 / 41.2
WII THE LEGEND OF ZELDA:TW - 49.99 / 40.00
WII RED STEEL REVOLUTION - 49.99 / 41.22

When it launched, the PS2 retailed for $300 and stores made $9 off of it.  The Xbox retailed for $300 and stores bought it for $301 (I think).  The GameCube made stores about $10 when it retailed for $200.

I think these figures just show how much Nintendo is overpricing their accessories.  The controller costs $40 at retail, but Nintendo sells it to stores at $32...Nintendo must easily be making $15 or $20 per remote.  Nintendo could have just as easily packaged the remote and nunchuk together for $50 and still be making a lot of money... but they decided to gouge consumers and make even more.  That's what I believe.

[WuTangTurtle]

Kairon all systems sell for a profit for retailers except for those that retailers buy before a price cut is set, that is why sometimes you see retailers sell those pre-price cut systems at the old price instead of the new price.  

The difference in what the retailers pay and what MSRP is does not have much to do with Nintendo's profit at all.  The system is probably costing Nintendo $220 to make so they probably sell it at $230 to retailers where they turn around and sell it at $249.99 MSRP so everyone makes money on it.

Games on the other hand only give retailers >$5 each, when i worked at Sam Goody we had a way of finding out how much a CD, DVD, Games, or anything else in the store would profit us per sale.  CDs we would usually only make $2-5.  This is why u see music stores and game stores sell used products, it really is the only real profit making items.

[wandering]

Quote
Nintendo sells it to stores at $32...Nintendo must easily be making $15 or $20 per remote.

So...you think it costs Nintendo $12-17 to make each remote?

[BigJim]

Heh. I just realized those displays are all cardboard.

They definitely get a small slice on the other consoles too. I forget exactly what the store cost was, but some site similar to Digg or engadget had itemized the 360 stock like this.

[BigJim]

It costs MS about $15 to make, package, and ship the 360 wireless controllers. They take a good chunk of profit on top of that, and the retailers probably get around $8-$10ish too.

I can't fathom the Wiimote costing more than $20 tops.

[Dirk Temporo]

So the controller gloves are basically skins?