2 HOT 2 Handle: Demand high for PlayStation2

Wednesday, Dec. 6, 2000 | 9:57 a.m.

PlayStation2 is in the mail.

Officials for Sony, manufacturer of one the holiday season's most popular holiday gift items, say 100,000 units are being shipped to North American retailers every week.

The retailers want to know where they are.

"We would love to have them in our stores, but none of them have them," said Sharon Weber, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman who works in the company's Rogers, Ark., headquarters. "Like all of the other retailers in the country, we're patiently waiting for shipments. We are expecting more. They're telling us hopefully before Christmas."

Wal-Mart, with more than 3,000 outlets, is the biggest retailer in the United States, but gets no preferential treatment when it comes to receiving PlayStation2s.

"The shortage is nationwide. PlayStation2 came out Oct. 26 and we were sold out within 15 minutes," Weber said. "It's incredible."

According to Sony's official website, manufacturing problems are being blamed for the delays, which has Toys R Us, Kmart, Target and other retailers singing the "PS2 blues."

PS2 is the popular name for the console, on which electronic games are played. It is the successor to PlayStation, which was released six years ago.

Games for the consoles are available for youngsters in the 11-to-17 age range, as well as for adults.

The consoles retail for $299.99 in the United States, compared to 299 pounds ($425) in Britain, 2,990 francs ($385) in France and 869 marks ($375) in Germany.

"We are working around the clock to provide as many units as possible to North American retailers," Stephanie Iwamasa, Sony spokeswoman for PS2 in San Francisco, said. "We're shipping 100,000 units per week, on average. We started with 500,000 on October 26."

Iwamasa said the company should have delivered 1.3 million units by the end of the year and three million by March 31.

"We are behind schedule about a month or so," she said. "We have never slowed production by any means. It's just that the reception has been tremendous.

"PlayStation has more than 27 million units in the United States alone," she said. "The anticipation for PlayStation2 was pretty high, and we planned according to that. But we are continually surprised by the demand."

PlayStations generally are bought by or for males ranging in age from 18 to 30, Iwamasa said, adding, "Typically they are people who are early adopters of new gadgets of the highest quality in electronics."

Best Buy, at 2050 N. Rainbow Blvd., has a display model for customers to try, but none for sale as late as Monday. Other Las Vegas stores that normally would have PS2s told the Sun they don't even have them for display.

Best Buy General Manager John Penn said shipments of six or seven units have been trickling in, but he doesn't know when they will arrive and they are gone as soon as they hit the shelves.

"If we had 1,000, we could sell them all," Penn said.

He said the run on PS2s has been phenomenal. Although the consoles sell for almost $300, the average amount spent is $400-$500.

"They don't just buy a console, they buy games to go with it," Penn said. "And the console only comes with one control so you have to buy a second control for two people to play." The second control is about $30, and games are about $40.

"We've had similar situations with things like Furby and Power Rangers," he said. "This one is different because it is a high-ticket item."

High prices aren't scaring anyone away.

"Initially we were sent 140 units to go on sale Oct. 26," Penn said. "People began lining up at midnight with their lounge chairs and coolers.

"At about 5 a.m. we began handing out numbers. When the doors opened we had a special line in the store, and we sold out within 45 minutes."

Penn said Sony allocates units to different retailers based on sales of Sony consoles, and also sales of its games.

"Wal-Mart received fewer per store, they got 40 or 50 units, but they have more stores than we do so overall they received more," he said.

Best Buy tries to limit purchases of the PS2 consoles to one per customer, but Penn said that is difficult to do. A family of four may come in and have each person buy one.

That may explain how so many new PS2s, unopened, end up in the classified sections of the newspaper, where the asking price starts at $600. Penn said he saw one on the Internet for $800. Almost 20 were listed in one recent classified listing in the Sun.

One seller, who identified himself only as Joe, said he decided to sell his PS2 through the classified ads without opening it because he has the Sega Dreamcast game and claims it is as good as the Sony product.

"A friend at a game store got me (a PS2) before they sold out," he said. "I got it to either play it or sell it, and decided to sell it after reading about all the things it could do. It's pretty advanced, but compared to Dreamcast, it's not any better."

He's selling his PS2 for $600, but as of Monday (two days after putting the ad in the newspaper) he had not received any calls from prospective buyers.

Another seller, who declined to give his name, said he is selling his system for a friend who decided she didn't want to give it as a gift.

He said fewer than 10 people have called and left messages about the console, for which the owner is asking $600.

"They might call and leave a message asking if we'll take $500, and hang up," he said. "We may put it on eBay."

Of all the electronic games sold at Best Buy, Penn said PS2 has received the most attention. "They have the best graphics and the realism is incredible," he said.

His display model is getting plenty of use as young people stand in line, eagerly awaiting their turns at the controls of the console that is equipped with a 128-bit microprocessor, a DVD player and has the ability to connect to the Internet.

Ricardo Carranza, 15, barely took his eyes off the game he played on the display model as he talked about his fascination with PS2. It is on his Christmas wish list, even though he has a PlayStation that is only a year old.

"There are more graphics and they're more realistic," he said.

The teenager has been playing electronic games since he was 5 years old, and said he plays an average of two hours per day. He also has Supersega, Nintendo and other game consoles.

PS2 generated $165 million in sales in North America during the first three days it was on the market, setting a record for console sales, according to Sony.

Kristin Jahnky, with Target's headquarters in Minneapolis, Minn., said her company has no idea when it might get a shipment, and when the merchandise does come in it will be sold on a first come first served basis.

"Each guest should have the same chance to buy one," she said.

Kmart spokeswoman Nicole Dowswell, speaking from company headquarters in Troy, Mich., said her company's 2,100 stores received 25,000 PS2 consoles on Oct. 26 and within minutes they were gone.

"We offer no rain checks, no pre-sales and you can't be placed on a waiting list," she said. "We can't guarantee when they will be in stock. We are receiving them, but it is hit and miss. There will be no large shipment before Christmas.

"It's like every holiday season. There is always a hot item. It is a very hot item this year. The demand is great. We were able to meet some of the supply issue, but the demand was greater than we expected."

While there is no proof that the shortage of PS2s is manufactured, it would not surprise Marianne Szymanski, head of a company that tests toys.

The president of Toy Tips, based in Beverly Hills, Calif., Szymanski said hot toys often are merely "hyped toys." The hype might create a shortage that would not have otherwise existed, which is a temptation to toy marketers trying to move merchandise.

There have been many famous shortages around the holidays, beginning with Cabbage Patch dolls in the early 1980s. In more recent years there have been shortages of Furbys and Tickle Me Elmo dolls.

"The media goes crazy (over shortages)," she said. "The (marketing) strategy is to create the media hype."

Toy Tips' labs at the University of Missouri in St. Louis are testing PS2 consoles, but the results won't be in before Christmas.

While safety is often the focus of tests, with computer games it is usually to determine if the product is appropriate for the age to which it is being marketed.

Some games might be considered too violent or too difficult for young children.

"I have no problem with video games (in general), but they need to make the content appropriate for the age of the child," Szymanski said.

Parents, she said, need to be more aware of the things they buy for their children and not buy it because it is a fad.

"They need to research (the items) and learn what's going on and not buy something just because the kid is nagging," she said.

While PS2s are big this year, she said three years ago it was Nintendo 65, and two years ago it was Sega's Dreamcast.

"They play this game," she said. "Next year it will be Nintendo again."

While most folks are having difficulty finding a PS2, others are tripping over them.

Comic Wayne Brady, from the ABC series "Whose Line Is It Anyway?" said Sony gave him one when they learned he was a fan of the product.

"It's incredible," said Brady, who was in Las Vegas for a recent performance. "And the games for it are great.

"That's the great part of being on the road and being away from my wife and my house and my dogs. At least in my hotel room I can sit there and veg and play and not worry about my wife coming in and telling me to get off (of the machine)."

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