Random: Nintendo Is Now Refusing To Offer Stock To Amazon France After Disagreements

Nintendo showing yet again how much they care about making sure you get charged more.

I guess you could say they flipped the Switch.

Amazon are at fault here, they have too much buying power.. It's unfair to smaller retailers.
If physical store retailers can't compete then you won't see Nintendo stuff in stores therefore ultimatelyreducing volume of sales.

Well Nintendo have SWITCHED it up for Amazon XD

Ahhh human greeds....and stupidity... and selfishness...

Sacré bleu! The French connection is in jeopardy! Amazon France better get an 'eiffel' of the contract!

Well, time for Ebay & Playasia to buy games.

I am sure this has nothing to do with Amazon France's notoriety of leaking release information on their site with alarming frequency.

To be fair to Nintendo it's not just them who has had an issue with Amazon. Sony have had their own dispute over the last year with systems and various games taken of their pages for relatively chunky periods. Seem to remember PS4 consoles not being available on Prime Day in the U.S.

That's dumbest thing I've heard Nintendo. You are constantly promoting BB or Wal-Mart when they offer deals, let Amazon do what they want and get those systems out in the wild.

@ryancraddock I've looked into article when it was posted in the forums, neither Amazon or Nintendo have officially commented on the issue & therefore the "product pricing" issue is speculation on the part of IGN. Also, it's worth noting that Amazon & Nintendo have had similar fall outs dating back to 2012.. when Amazon tried to force Nintendo into letting them sell at a discount by accusing Nintendo of shipping them scratched 3DS'.

Here's an article from 2013 on Kotaku where Amazon was not stocking Nintendo products & actively advising customers to buy other manufacturers hardware. https://kotaku.com/oh-wow-amazon-really-hates-nintendo-consoles-465285000

Fnac has more interesting deals anyway, if you pre-order at least.

@Spoony_Tech @saintayu To be fair on Nintendo, we don't know exactly who is at fault here, Amazon have fallen out with both Nintendo and Sony in the past, trying dirty tactics to bring prices down.

If Nintendo were to allow Amazon to discount the Switch as much as Amazon is likely demanding, this will see a similar response from retailers such as Target/Walmart etc... meaning Amazon would push for MORE discounts. Nintendo need to stand firm until they bring costs of manufacture down.

@saintayu @Spoony_Tech Read comment #3 for a proper answer.

Nintendo has always been expensive. When you buy their hardware you get the very basic system. You still have to get yourself much more memory since they offer very very little space (they know what they're doing). You still have to spend more money than you should. At least with Ps4 xbox one you did get your 500gb space voor 299 euro. There's a difference between them and offering a much stronger hardware. You see what's wrong here? And people still are defending it. With that said... i'm still waiting for a proper next hardware from Nintendo so I can buy it. I'm not supporting their last systems because of this. If they make a pricedrop for 199 euro for the basic system I will get it. But hey this i my opinion. You don't have to agree with me

Amazon fights with everyone - Sony, Nintendo, Google (try watching Youtube on a Fire device), publishers. It's bad for both Amazon and Nintendo but unlike when the Wii U was crashing and burning and not on Amazon US probably wasn't helping the Switch will be fine.

They'll work it out, or they won't, wont' matter too much either way.

@Alucard83 Some games being 50-100Gb a piece such as GTA or others are hardly comparable to 1-6Gb on average on Switch.

@Alucard83 To be fair on Nintendo, when PS4 & XboxOne launched they were €400 & €500 respectively. Also, the PS4 and XboxOne are basically PCs in plastic boxes, requiring a lot less research and development spending.

Nintendo's prices will come down, but price cuts usually come when demand starts to slow down or a new, cheaper to manufacture version of the hardware is released- the Switch is still selling well around the globe.

@Megal0maniac Also has a good point, the flash memory that the Switch uses means games take up less space to begin with.

Nintendo has been doing this garbage for ages - they got sued and lost in the US over the same tactics decades ago.

https://www.nytimes.com/1991/04/11/business/nintendo-to-pay-25-million-in-rebates-on-price-fixing.html

Today a Retailer the size of Amazon not going to play ball. Especially when SONY/Microsoft lets them do whatever they like.

@ryancraddock Thanks for your kind response, just adding some additional context, but it does look like you have everything covered. I don't think Amazon like any business big enough that they can't bully them. Personal opinion of course.

A rude Frenchman, well I never.

@gauthieryannick that is not how "the world works"

Nintendo already got paid from the distributor. They not loosing anything. In a free market The retailer decides what their Price and Profits are.

I think most people seem to have lost the actual situation. This is not about Nintendo's profit or even amazon's. It is about amazon taking less profit to guarantee its dominance on the market and possibly kill competitors. Nintendo is just reassuring other retailers that this won't happen. Amazon is kinda evil, no surprises. In this situation Nintendo are actually the good guys, protecting the smaller businesses which cannot play on amazon's terms.

France has the right idea Switch should never have been set at $299. Loved when Nintendo first party games were $10 cheaper then the average game.

I don't want to defend Amazon here. Not liking them in particular, only spending there when I usually can't get what I want from other sources. But the problem highlighted here is bigger than what people think it is.

This is about, in simpler words, price fixing. A company dictating to others how they should price their products. Which is supposed to go against competition laws in many countries. But companies like Nintendo (and Apple, Sony, Microsoft) actually go aournd these laws with distribution agreements, which in the end gets the same results and prevents vendors to compete with each others as all have the same price.

Those "distribution agreements" are just "price fixing" under a different name. You want to sell our products? Well, we dictate the price, otherwise, we'll stop sending you products to sell.

Practices like these should have no place in a free market.

Pro-Reaganomics small-government Constitutional conservative business analyst reporting in. All the people decrying Nintendo's move as a negative anti-capitalist stance need to consider the larger picture.

Amazon is no mom and pop retailer; they are taking advantage of their position as a retail giant to secure huge guaranteed stockpiles of product from companies like Nintendo, and then strategically selling that product at ridiculously competitive costs to kill competition from smaller companies and ensure that all consumers who buy the Nintendo Switch in that region are buying exclusively from them. Once they have a guaranteed market hold on the product and no other retailer supplies the Switch, they will mark up its cost to the usual MSRP value or higher for special bundles, and what you the consumer are left with is a deserted market where Amazon sellers are your only options for Switch hardware and software. The short-term consumer savings are outweighed by the destruction of market competition — companies like Amazon and Google are debate fodder in the ongoing discussion on determining exactly how successful and how large a company can become in a competitive market before its success actually begins to have a negative impact on the average consumer.

A good way to look at it is: do you go to a particular supermarket for your food and groceries? That supermarket is now the only supermarket on the planet, and everyone in the world including you is now dependent on that supermarket's continued success for food, and should they mark up their prices so much that you can't afford to buy food or should that location fail because they are selling at a loss or because they are too big or too small to service every consumer effectively, you are no longer able to eat because no one else sells groceries and the farms and suppliers of the food are locked into 20 year exclusive contracts with that supermarket and lack the sales infrastructure to sell their products to the entire population of the planet directly (and couldn't even if they tried because the big supermarket has contacts with your local chamber of commerce and will wring the supplier for every cent they're worth in legal fees for breaking contractual competition clauses).

While it sounds unpleasant to imply we should be happy to pay more than we have to for a given product, it is actually a fair decision on Nintendo's part to restrict Amazon France's ability to sell their products until they can agree to sell at a cost that is competitive but does not negatively impact other Nintendo dealers' ability to operate, as doing so will inhibit Nintendo's ability to distribute their products in global markets and thus hurt Nintendo's bottom line, which in turn hurts you the consumer when the developers stop being paid and the games stop being made.

@cfgk24 sales already have been slowing down amazon is not at fault here.
Just the old arrogant nintendo being back at it again.

@gauthieryannick Nintendo pulled out because Amazon is not willing to have them dictate pricing to them.

The Hit on the price reduction is taken by the retailer. It is in the article you just read

"While it would be Amazon which takes the hit from this price drop, rather than Nintendo"

@Majora101 spot on. Loss leading by market attrition. It’s essentially a “lawful” way to attempt distribution monopolization long term.

@gauthieryannick
Maybe. But Maybe not.
Maybe Amazon wanted to sell Switch consoles at a lower price AND absorb the cost themselves, which should be absolutely NO business to Nintendo. A seller has (or should have) the right to sell their products at whatever price they want. If they want to sell at a loss, it's their decision.

Problem is that all big companies nowadays are finding ways to fix their prices, which is usually illegal in many countries, by way of distribution agreements with retailers. So basically, they're not asking the vendor to set prices at a specific point, but instead only say that failure to sell at MSRP could result in the stopping of shipments of units to sell.

Just enough to not be labelled "price fixing" by the authorities, but enough to be, indeed, price fixing in all but name.

So it's not "we dictate prices to all sellers". It's more like "We tell sellers to sell at our prices, otherwise we're just not sending them any units to sell".

Most major electronic companies do this nowadays.

I'd prefer if Nintendo just stop dealing with Amazon and Walmart entirely since they are representative of everything wrong with Capitalism and I'd love to see both companies crumble into nothingness. I can dream

@Majora101 Not only has the model existed for years - but it is also been (being) used on the competing products by SONY and Microsoft for the past 5 years Nintendo was irrelevant. And this retail apocalypse never happened.

Amazon never became the only place to buy a PS4/Xbox1... later raising the Price after cornering the market.

It is extremely self serving to think that now that the model is being applied to the Switch - Doom is around the corner.

Apple/Samsung can't tell Verizon they can't do a "buy 1 get one free iPhone/Galaxy" because Sprint/Tmobile can't afford to do the same. Apple got payed, Retailers set prices. They can even give it away... it is up to them.

@Realnoize
Amazon selling things at a loss is bad for Nintendo, other retailers, and, ultimately, consumers. If Amazon sells it for less, which they can do because they can afford to absorb the losses, consumers end up shopping there to save some money, and eventually other retailers close up shop since they were unable to compete with Amazon's aggressive pricing. Then, when Amazon has cleared the field, they can charge however the hell much they want above the MSRP because there is no competition. Amazon has gotten too big. Probably my only problem with Nintendolife.com is their frequent "articles" that are just links to different Amazon Product Listing pages.

EDIT:
Didn't realize Majora101 had already said the same thing. Also, you said it much better than I, so kudos to you

@Agramonte You are thinking too narrowly in terms of market scope (Amazon deals in more than video game retail; the average consumer would not suffer the long-term consequences until Amazon controls the market for every single product you purchase) and you are thinking too short-sightedly.

The effects of this business strategy cripple small and med-size businesses and have devastating long-term economic effects that you are not going to see in a mere five years. In three hundred years of market undercutting (assuming the market is regulated no more or less than it is today), Amazon will be the source of every product you touch, from the Amazon Fresh-delivered food in your Amazon Cold fridge and the water in your Amazon Tap sink to electronics, cars/flying space mobiles, medicine and healthcare products, etc., and the prices you pay in both the literal sense and the additional costs of relying on the one source of product for everything in your life will be immeasurable.

Remember that in a free society, market competition is a good thing, and bowing to a single hyper-competitor is no different to bowing to the every whim of a dictatorial government, because you will find that the two entities will often go hand-in-hand.

@Realnoize "If they want to sell at a loss, it's their decision."

No, it's not. In France it's illegal for a reseller to sell at a loss. Maybe Amazon are close to it, but they can't sell at a price inferior to the trade price for the console (although I've no idea how much that is in this case...)

Can’t care less. Famous 2nd hand « leboncoin « can provide near endless stream of brand new switches, still under warranty...

@Majora101 This is the same thing people said about big box retailers. It never happened.

"In terms of market scope" the idea that this somehow can be stopped/started because of the Switch pricing is illogical.

This is a strong arm tactic. Keep the price at what we want - or we will cut you out. That is not good for consumers anywhere.

And again, Nintendo was told to stop doing this in the US ages ago. Who were they "defending us" against back then?

https://www.nytimes.com/1991/04/11/business/nintendo-to-pay-25-million-in-rebates-on-price-fixing.html

I really don't understand why selling a console cheaper is bad for the consumer. Seriously why is it so bad to buy the console 20-30 euros cheaper? Saving money is never a bad thing and I always buy from the cheapest shop I can find.

Also I can't understand why Nintendo does not set a price in the eurozone. It is legal and retailers can sell at their loss if they want. For example PS4 was 399 or 409 at launch in the eurozone depending on local taxes. Vita was 249 everywhere.

@Refurin
Well, of course it is bad. I understand that. I just wanted to use an example to highlight the idea that a business shouldn't be "forced" to sell its products at a price imposed to them by a third party. Because this goes against the principle of competition and free market.

I completely understand that big businesses taking a loss to force smaller stores out of business is bad. That's why I usually shop elsewhere than on Amazon. My example was a bad one (although a store should be allowed to clear some stock below cost if they have overstock that they can't sell - although in Amazon's case, that's not what it is about). But I still insist that forcing vendors to sell at a set price is illegal as well in many countries.

But most big companies nowadays have found other ways to sidestep those legal limitations. And nobody in any competition bureau anywhere seems to care about that.

@Franklin 10/10 reference there, would recommend to a friend.

@belmont

Stores like Amazon are not allowed to set the price they want, be it under or above what is ordered by the manufacturer. Why? Because every big store chains nowadays agree to some distribution agreements that prevents them from doing so, otherwise the manufacturer will not ship them any more units to sell. And that's more than probably what happenned with Amazon.

This is a way for electronic manufacturers to control prices of their items in stores, which is often illegal in many countries. Price fixing is illegal. But not supplying someone with units to sell because of a contract breach is not.

Nintendo (and others) don't want some stores to sell it for cheaper, as they think this would affect the perceived value of what they sell. Same with Apple, for instance. They want to be seen as a "premium" brand selling premium goods, and so premium goods aren't sold for cheap. You don't want stores competiing by offering better prices, as this will bring prices down. Only way to manage that is to control prices yourself, which is usually illegal, so you sidestep that and do some form of distribution agreement, which means you'll just stop sending units to sell to those who don't sell at the price you tell them to.

Fire Reggie?

Has to be said though, Amazon are doing a great job of killing off other retailers.

There has to be a different reason for the disagreement. Producers of consumer goods are forbidden by European law to fix prices - it's on retailers to do so. That's why Nintendo Directs in JP and US sometimes include prices while EU don't.

Finally someone is standing up to Amazon... can’t wait to see Bezos burn.

@saintayu Sure, blame Nintendo.

@Agramonte You are still not understanding the point. The act of adjusting Switch pricing is not the "turning point" of this conspirational near-term market collapse concept you are repeatedly citing so you can dismiss my argument by association with market collapse conspiracy theories instead of providing an actual response because you are not as smart as you think you are and you are lazy, which I can appreciate because I am both of these things as well, and great things can come from dumb and lazy people.

What you are not understanding is that the pricing of this one single item in the Switch is peanuts; the entire video game sales industry is chump change to Amazon. No one item or one market is going to cause a domino effect and suddenly the global economy mirrors that of Venezuela, rather it is the steady zombification of individual markets by Amazon over the long term that will have lasting negative consumer impact.

When you applaud Amazon every time they undercut competition on every item they sell, which inarguably inhibits small businesses' ability to compete in the short-term, you are applauding when they inevitably devour their competition when those companies file chapter one in the long-term and Amazon swallows the remains of that market. By doing this, Amazon slowly eats away at every competitor until they fail or accept a buy-out, and over the long-term, this will hurt the economy, and that means fewer products for you to buy, diminished quality in the products you do buy, less money in your pocket to spend because you are a mere working grunt in an increasingly have-vs-have-not economy, and reduced personal freedoms as a citizen of your country when Amazon decides to contract for your government in exchange for tax breaks and preferential treatment.

You do not need to look far even today to see the negative effects of Amazon's takeovers in American markets — imagine the problems of today's Amazon workers when applied at a global scale; the societal side effects incurred when Amazon is the only company in the world providing every service and every product you purchase and employ more than half of the world population because you, the fickle consumer, read short-sighted articles written by people with personal holdings in AMZN who told you market monopolies are a good thing. You won't be clapping like a monkey every time Amazon cannabilizes a market when your great grandchildren are unemployed due to job over-automation in a stagnant, inflated economy, or worse, employed by Amazon under inhumane conditions doing 14 hours of workload in 4 hours a day for $10 an hour only to spend it all on expensive green energy fuel for their vehicle going to and from their bad job being monitored every step of the way by Amazon in accordance with a government environmental initiative to monitor and tax their C02 output using Amazon tech. Below are just some of the problems Amazon presents today. Before missing the point a third time and replying with another incoherent response dismissing reality as fiction, think about whether or not you and the company employing business practices like this share the same values:

Whole Foods workers struggle to unionize under Amazon job cuts and reduced wages:
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/oct/01/whole-foods-amazon-union-organization-grocery-chain

Amazon workers share horror stories: 'Peeing in trash cans, constant surveillance'
http://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-warehouse-workers-share-their-horror-stories-2018-4

Amazon set to take 50% of US e-commerce:
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/12/amazon-to-take-almost-50-percent-of-us-e-commerce-market-by-years-end.html

'Under pressure, afraid to take bathroom breaks', inside Amazon:
https://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/under-pressure-afraid-to-take-bathroom-breaks-inside-amazons-fast-paced-warehouse-world/

Amazon to sell medication:
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/28/walgreens-cvs-shares-tank-after-amazon-buys-online-pharmacy-pillpack.html

Amazon listening more than ever:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/talkingtech/2018/09/22/coming-fall-amazon-listening-and-watching-more-than-ever/1385501002/

Seattle caves to Amazon tax demands:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/seattle-tax-opposed-amazon-likely-195828848.html

Paper: Amazon master of tax avoidance:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2018/04/09/trump-is-right-amazon-is-a-master-of-tax-avoidance/33653439/

'Alexa' in hotels lets Amazon spy on your vacation:
https://gizmodo.com/alexa-for-hospitality-lets-amazon-follow-you-on-vacatio-1826947384

Pentagon to begin moving data to Amazon secret Cloud:
http://www.nextgov.com/it-modernization/2018/03/defense-agency-begin-moving-classified-data-amazons-secret-cloud-after-protest/146619/

Amazon pushes facial recognition to police, prompting outcry over surveillance:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/22/technology/amazon-facial-recognition.html

Slaves to the algorithm: Amazon wristband tracks worker movements:
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/jan/31/amazon-warehouse-wristband-tracking

Amazon turns over seller data to state:
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/23/amazon-will-turn-over-third-party-seller-tax-data-to-massachusetts.html

Amazon to become world's third biggest bank?
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/06/amazon-could-become-the-third-biggest-us-bank-if-it-wants-to-bain-study.html

Amazon plan to put camera, microphone in every bedroom:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-5273947/Amazon-s-Echo-Spot-coming-UK-later-month.html

Amazon to open 3,000 cashier-less stores:
https://www.bloombergquint.com/onweb/2018/09/19/amazon-is-said-to-plan-up-to-3-000-cashierless-stores-by-2021

Amazon removes conservative sites from profit-sharing program:
http://dailycaller.com/2018/05/25/why-amazon-associates-removed-legal-insurrection-from-its-program/

Amazon plan to monitor employees' every move:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-6020525/Amazon-sparks-privacy-concerns-patent-reveals-employee-surveillance-AR-goggles.html

Amazon isn't paying its electric bills. You might be:
https://www.bloombergquint.com/businessweek/2018/08/20/amazon-isn-t-paying-its-electric-bills-you-might-be

Ahh, typical Amazon. Slash and burn, scorched earth. Loss-lead to undercut to secure a market segment almost unilaterally, then cut all promotions and pull unbridled profits, sinking half a marketplace in the process. Standard Oil for the 21st century!

@Agramonte It's evil vs. evil. Nintendo is a notorious price fixer, and it's sadly becoming ever more common. On the other hand, Amazon, like Walmart before them shuts down all competition by simply taking a loss to undercut until they dominate that market and squeeze out competition, leaving mostly just themselves. Then reverses course charges full or more, and nobody can fight it. Nintendo's not in the fight for their price fixing antics, but we all know Amazon's objectives are always market manipuation for domination, which ultimately causes excessive harm to companies like Nintendo, as Amazon now dictates their market for them, and their products vanish from other more valuable partners. In cases like this it's not just about what's happening, but about who's doing it and why.

OTOH, makes me wonder if some of my Switch preorders getting cancelled by Amazon have something to do with this.

@Majora101 I was listening until I saw Daily Caller. 😂 Seriously though, Amazon are abusing their privileges as a large retailer. Same as Walmart.

@The_ghostmen not at all, if FNAC or Carrefour, or Game complain to Nintendo that their competitors are undercutting them, they may not wish to stock Nintendo stuff.! Shelf space at retail is good for us all. Gamers, Nintendo, Retailers. Everyone.

Not a fan of Amazon.
They put others out of business, then raise prices.
I avoid buying there.

Everything’s chill with Amazon US though, right? I’ve got a bunch of Smash Ultimate stuff preordered there that I’m not interested in losing.

Based on the description in the article, another possible reason was Nintendo was probably afraid the Switches being sold at a lower price than they wanted would devalue the Switch everywhere, and thus refused to sell it to Amazon France if they discounted it too much (even if it was Amazon who was taking the hit of of the discount).

Another example of this is how many luxury retailers straight burn their unsold products because allowing them to be put on sale would devalue their brand.

There is an UPDATE !

https://gearnuke.com/amazon-cancelling-nintendo-game-pre-orders-amazon-vs-nintendo/

Nintendo has a right to try and uphold their brand integrity and not let it be devalued.

@Majora101 And again, every generation there has been an "Amazon". And every generation the call of an impending doom. Even "the Internet" as a whole was the "evil" that would bring the death of retail and Jobs.

And regardless what you think of Amazon, Walmart or any other company - it does nothing to justify the actions by Nintendo. They have done it before and 36 states and the US Federal government have already called it illegal. And there was no Amazon. They went after " the small retailers" you now defending

"I am not doing anything wrong - because look at what that other person is doing wrong" is not a defense for anything.

It is not in Nintendo's best interest to anger distributors other than Amazon, who if Amazon was allowed to continue may decide to stop stocking Nintendo products, thus limiting their presence at retail. Remember that even if software sales continue to grow more and more digital, consoles still need some retail shelf space to get distributed to the public at large (or virtual shelf space in the case of online retailers). The consumer may not win in the end, but you can blame that on retailers, not Nintendo themselves who has to please all of them if they hope to put their own system in YOUR hands.

Forget amazon

@Majora101 just so you know , and I appreciate every single point you've made whilst backing up your arguments with research, you're arguing with a troll. Said troll would rather blame Nintendo for 9/11 than admit that he's just here to troll

What a douche move to make

@NewAdvent Read the post by @cfgk24 for an understanding of why this makes sense. Sure it’s not great for consumers (in the short term), but it’s a good move to keep smaller retailers in business which has often been a problem over history, which in the long run ensures competitive pricing, rather than larger companies being able to dictate pricing with more ease once the smaller retailers are out of the picture.

Cheese-eatin' surrender monkeys!

@gortsi Well if Nintendo didn't make the Switch, this would never have happened. Ultimately it's Iwata's fault.

@Agramonte problem is dood that amazon france had no right to lower the switch price without getting nintendo consent first and top it all off amazon did the same $hit with sony reason why amazon not very popular with the 2 big game giants.

@Majora101

That's kind of an extreme take. In the US, Amazon represents 5% of all sales. On their website, third parties result in 68% of the sales. So typically they have been great to small businesses by giving them a more beneficial model to reach straight to consumers.

Every big business is going to have it's horror stories in working for them. http://time.com/money/5208407/best-places-to-work-linkedin/ According to that they are the #1 best place to work.

No market is a true free market or capital market. An example of a monopoly is Microsoft and Apple. Those two companies have been fined and sanctioned by many governments for their practice. In theory this keeps them honest in regards to how they treat consumers. I'd worry more about companies that own technology than a retail marketplace. Amazon does some impressive stuff with their delivery system, but their sales of other peoples products isn't going to put everyone out of business. I'd be much more worried about their individual product offerings like Alexa, digital music, digital movies, and all their tech products. If you get invested in that ecosystem, it will be much harder to break. But really all their competitors like Apple are doing the same things on that front.

And honestly there has to be an inbetween. Amazon does alot of great things with their consumer benefits. Yeah, I'd like to see small businesses make strides to be more competitive. But I'm not willing to pay 50% more and not be able to return things or be forced to accept whatever terms they give out. It reminds me of healthcare (being in the US). Yeah, our society is out of shape, doesn't take care of ourselves, overuses healthcare. And I think that our health care companies are doing their best to keep costs down and give great health care. But the model isn't working. There needs to be innovation so things will improve. Amazon is a disrupter in the commerce market showing that people need to do better. And as a consumer I think it's gotten better to an extent as companies realize they need to compete with Amazon or go out of business. Could the scale tip too far and Amazon be the only place to shop? Maybe it does. But usually there are other innovative companies that come along and challenge and rarely does a company stay on top forever. Plus, maybe we as consumers will realize that 95% of the stuff we buy is crap and just stop buying as much.

@PrincessBowsette A retailer has no need to get anyones "consent" to set a price.

The item at the store do not belong to Nintendo. You are not buying it from Nintendo. They got payed at the wholesaler.

BestBuy does not need to ask Apple if they can sell the iMac $200 off.

Verizon does not need to ask Samsung if they can do Buy 1 get 1 Free with the Galaxy

Dominos does not need to ask CocaCola if they can give you a FREE 2 liter Coke with a medium size Pizza.

You not getting any of that from them. Bestbuy, Verizon, Dominos are the ones taking the hit. What "smaller store" can afford to match them is also irrelevant.

Nintendo: "Do you want to sell our Switch on your site?"
AmazonFr: "Oui"

Nintendo: "No, no, not the Wii. The new gaming system, the Switch."
AmazonFr: "Oui! Oui!"

Nintendo: "...Fine! We'll take our business elsewhere!"

I doubt Nintendo cares how high Amazon's percentage of Switch systems sold is. What they care about is the perception of value of the system. They don't want other retailers to drop the price to match Amazon's price and drive that downwards as they compete, nor do they want consumers to start questioning the msrp. It's why Nintendo sets a msrp in the first place rather than leaving it in the hands of the retailers.

@cfgk24 THANK YOU for pointing that out.

This isn't Ninendo being a [removed]. It's them trying to avoid a situation where they can only sell their products via Amazon.

_{Please mind your language - Octane}

Can I ask a question?
Do people LIKE seeing big Nintendo Retail displays in Physical stores?
Or would they prefer a small or no display there?

@Alucard83 Well to be fair, as someone who also own's a Playstation 4 plus XboxOne, 500gb are nothing. In relation compared to NSwitch Games the Games of PS4 and Xbox are way bigger... 60 up to 100gb are pretty common so in relation to that you don't have "more gb" anyway... and by the way in case of PS4 / X1 you even have an forced installation... so unlike switch were most Retail-Games don't need any kind of space except Updates....

Looks like France lost again.

@Alucard83 I fully agree with this logic. The thing I don't get is why hypocrites don't apply it for videogames. Why would I buy an old gen videogames like Yakuza or Persona when for the same price I can get a real next gen game like Spiderman or God of War that was made with real ambition and a team of over 200 developers?

@cfgk24 I'm neutral there. I don't ever buy games anywhere but online, so ads in retail stores don't really do anything for me. I also almost always make an informed purchase, and an ad certainly won't sway me in any direction.

Personally I wouldn't mind seeing big Nintendo retail displays in physical stores, but I also wouldn't mind not seeing them. As long as I can buy the game(s) online.

@sikthvash it's "sacrebleu", one word, no accent pronounced "sacr bluh" and probably only used by people over 90. You people have a really weird image of France, probably from the 1930s-1940s.
But sadly we are really good at this kind of drama. Funny this only happens between a Japanese and an American giant in France!

@Rhaoulos Eh, not so sure about that. Spent two weeks in France this Summer, heard it uttered more than 15 times I did not live in an old people's home, incase that would be your next question xD

Also, man most French people are still absolutely horrible at anything but French... Germany was eh, but France takes the cake, holy crap. Even in Spain and Portugal there were no issues. Greece? Zilch. Italy? Well, they're Italians, but it worked.

But France? Jesus, can't even ask a university student to explain something.

My knowledge of the French language is quite limited, but I don't think a single person even attempted to speak English bar someone walking around in a T-shirt with the text "PROUD INDIAN MAIL" on it. He wasn't great at it, but the man tried.

I tried my way with French, but as soon as you're not fluently explaining the meaning of life, nobody understands anything.

Little rant there, sorry about that. Felt good to write it down though. Paris was neat, and some of the smaller cities were ok too, but ultimately the English proficiency was the same.

@Blizzia That's cool.
But walking past all those Nintendo displays creates awareness, for parents for example.
Little Johnny to mummy. "look! Mummy! I want Mario for Xmas!" 😊

@cfgk24 Sure, but in a few years little Johnny is circulating online shops saying "Look mummy! I want Mario for Xmas!".

Heck, I barely know anyone with kids who don't just look for things online. The kids use tablets and stuff at very young ages so it's just a natural progression.

@Blizzia Then there's the Christmas Shopping Queues at the dept. store 😊
Is true that online shopping is increasing though.

Amazon France are 100% at fault... They where selling the consoles at a loss to themselves only to ensure people purchased through their website to increase ad revenue.

Couple that with the extra accessories people would get with the Switch through their online shop, Amazon was playing a dirty game. Now they can go without for a while.

@Rhaoulos Apologies! My knowledge of the language is poor, despite my step Dad being French & that I studied French new wave cinema =0p I was just going for a jokey / pun effort, which wasn't aimed at the French. Unfortunately a lot of the stereotypical depictions stick for all countries, but I don't see the French that way & I have nothing but respect for them.
Hopefully Amazon France & Nintendo will find a solution, as really the consumer will miss out on choice.

@AlternateButtons

Except usually it is not the manufacturer that takes the hit for the cost but more the retailers. it's not like Amazon will tell Nintendo that it needs to give Amazon the Switch for €20 less, it is more Amazon probably would have taken the loss on this with the idea that it will get more people to spend money on other things like games, accessories and potentially services which is where they would make the bulk of their money.

@Amsterdamsters Yes how dare me blame the company making the decision. I should just blame any other group. Damn Harry Potter fans making Nintendo not give stock to Amazon France.

@DanteSolablood Amazon regularly discounts things. It's what being a discount retailer is all about. Walmart also does this as does any other discount retailer. The 3DS have been discounted a lot lately for example. Nintendo loses nothing from this as they are paid the same amount.

@AlternateButtons Amazon pays the same price and takes the hit. Did you even read the actual article? Nintendo is out absolutely no money.

@Razer what you just described is capitalism. Places discount things to get you into their stores or websites to buy other things. It's kind of the whole thing that allows sales. I expect better from someone who pretends we should listen to their personal sales forecasts all the time.

@Heavyarms55 Nintendo is free to do anything they want. They get the same amount of money for the purchase. As far as I know they haven't pulled the 3DS stock from Amazon when they have it on sale. They are doing this purely because the fact that Amazon knocked money off makes them look bad.

@Blizzia
I'm pretty sure what I say is right. My French is pretty good since I've been speaking French my entire life. The modern equivalent for sacrebleu would be "la vache!" (the cow, not a clue where this comes from), "putain!" (a vulgar version of dammit), "mon dieu" (my god) or a combo (the awesome part of the French language): "Nom de dieu de putain de bordel de merde".

French people aren't always horrible at speaking English, BUT (there is a huge BUT) they are reluctant to speak another language. This is the dumbest reason: French people are always making fun of anyone who make mistakes speaking French regardless of how many language that person speaks. Because of this, they think everyone will make fun of them for trying to speak another language.

Personally I'll be flattered if you try to speak my language and if you make a mistake, I'll just correct it to help you, not to make fun of you because this is what I would expect from an English speaking person.

Edit: Paris is a horrible city to live in. Parisians are jerks and the only 2 ways to enjoy Paris is to be born there and not knowing anything else, or just for a couple weeks as a tourist.

@sikthvash
No apology necessary. I was just messing with you (see above).
I also like to use dated exclamation like "sacrebleu", "saperlipopette" or "diantre" to spark some weird conversations.

In movies, it always makes me smile to always see the very old stereotypes with every single person wearing striped shirts, a beret, drinking a glass of red wine with a baguette stuck under the arm and an Edith Piaf song in the background.

@saintayu Thanks for your response! First of all I would like to confirm that the article is speculation & Amazon has fallen out with Nintendo in the past as well as Sony & Microsoft... the common denominator being Amazon. I attached a link in an earlier post in-which Amazon falsely accused Nintendo of sending out damaged goods in order to secure a discount.

In regards to the Nintendo getting paid the same, this is not entirely correct. As Amazon is such a large retailer, any discounts that they put on Nintendo's products will put tremendous pressure on other retailers including Walmart etc. to either match or beat those discounts - that pressure returns to Nintendo.

The 3DS is a bad example as it's not only a much older console but the margins that stores have are a lot larger (the cost of production is tiny compared to it's retail price). I would also note that in the past when the 3DS was new... Amazon refused to stock the 3DS as well.

Either way, the Switch is Nintendo's product & they are free to decide whether they want a store to sell their product - if Nintendo do not trust a site, they are free to pull their hardware.

@DanteSolablood I mean one only has to check reviews on various sites and media outlets to see that at one point Nintendo was sending out defective Switches.

We also don't know the difference in production cost between the 3DS and the Switch. I would imagine it's not an extremely high amount given the way Nintendo sources parts. Amazon having something routinely on sale doesn't force anyone to match that price and no one else has despite this being a regular occurrence.

But thanks for being civil and giving a coherent response my friend. XD