It would not be a holiday shopping season without a toy shortage, and this year, consumers are clamouring for the out-of-stock Nintendo Wii video-game console. For the second straight year, electronics stores around Metro Vancouver are out of stock of the innovative game system heading into Christmas, said Rick Lee, assistant manager at EB Games in Burnaby."They're just the most popular item in the video-game market this year. They're really hard to come by because any time we get them, they just fly right out the door," Lee told CBC News on Wednesday. Shoppers like Natalie Boucher and her whole family have scoured the Lower Mainland in a last-minute attempt to get their hands on one."We've called as far away as Kamloops and Bellingham in the U.S. to try and find one of these Wii's, but so far no luck," Boucher said.
Local stores are not the only ones hit by the shortage; from New Zealand to New York, the consoles are in short supply. On Sunday, shoppers in Florida lined up overnight for 97 Wiis that sold out in less than 30 minutes. In Vancouver, one Future Shop store received a shipment of 100 Wiis last Friday, general manager Mike Coghill told CBC News. "We had a lineup that started in front of the store at 6 a.m. and we had enough people to fill the 100 Wiis by 7 a.m.," said Coghill.
View: Full Story @ CBC News
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