UK consumers bought 200,000 Nintendo Wiis over Xmas

Nintendo sold almost 200,000 Wiis in the UK and more than 500,000 of the next-gen console across the rest of Europe during December 2006, the company has claimed. However, it also admitted it's still having a job shipping out enough of them.

Nintendo launched Wii on 8 December but almost immediately some retailers questioned whether all would-be buyers were going to get their hands on the machine by Christmas.

DSG, owner of PC World, Currys and dixons.co.uk said at the time: "We're expecting four deliveries between now and Christmas and we expect them all to go to pre-orders. If customers haven't already pre-ordered then they've probably missed the boat."

Yesterday, Nintendo Europe marketing director Laurent Fischer admitted the company is still "facing stock shortages", blaming the "high demand" for the console. He said Nintendo was "attempting to deliver both consoles and games to retailers on a daily basis".

Nintendo's sales figures come from UK market monitor Chart Track. The numbers also show that UK consumers bought more than 500,000 Nintendo DS handheld consoles, enough to position it as the UK's top-selling games machine not only during December 2006 but throughout the year, Nintendo said. ®