Cammie watch – Wii sales may have peaked

Everyones favourite mum has shared concerns that the glory days of the Wii may have come to an end as sales reach a plateau

Cammie Dunaway, Nintendo’s vice president of marketing in the US, described to Wired magazine’s Chris Kohler her concerns about declining sales of the successful Wii console. “It’s natural that at this point in the lifecycle, going in to our fifth year, that we’re probably not going to sell as many units next year as we sold this year. That’s the course of a cyclical business.”

Cammie remains upbeat about the future lifespan of the Wii at retail, citing the high life-to-date sales over the last three years and the high install base that will continue to consume software. “But that’s not to say that we can’t continue to sell a lot of units for a long period of time. Even with an installed base of over 28 million people (in the U.S.), that’s still shy of PlayStation 2’s installed base of close to 50 million people. So it suggests that we can still sell a lot.”

Despite signs of a public lack of interest in the Wii throughout 2009, the console still managed to beat out the competition at Christmas in America last year, shifting 3.81 million units in the month of December alone – a phenomenal effort. Only time will tell whether 2010 will be just as successful a year for Nintendo, but with a software line-up that includes a new Super Mario Galaxy game, Metroid: Other M and, very likely, a new Wii Zelda game, there are plenty of reasons to stay optimistic.

Source: Wired