Harvey Norman bully Nintendo, Nintendo bite back

Back in September there were reports that Nintendo and Harvey Norman were on track to start stocking Wii in light of the local Playstation 3 delay. It now seems Harvey Norman will not be stocking any Nintendo consoles, with Nintendo refusing to accept Harvey Normans trading terms and denying the retailer the hot ticket item this Christmas.

As we know Harvey Norman was one of the first retailers in Australia to take to the PS3 advertising charge, making itself one of the first stores to accept PS3 pre-orders and even going as far as advertising it on TV. However when Sony decided Australia would not be seeing the Playstation 3 this Christmas, they thought they better jump onto the Nintendo bandwagon. No doubt since the Wii will be the only new console out this season. Reports of negotiations between Nintendo and Harvey Norman are said to never have happened with Nintendo Public Relations Manager, Vispi Bhopti saying;

They are telling the market that we are in discussions with them but this is not true. We dont like their terms or the way they operate and we are refusing to do business with them.

Why is Harvey Norman the only retailer having problems with Nintendo? To put it simply, it is greed;

We are dealing with most mass retailers with the exception of Harvey Norman. Their terms are ridiculous. The Nintendo Wii is set to be a hot product going into the peak Xmas buying period so why should we give away margin to Harvey Norman. We are confident that the new Nintendo gaming console will drive sales during the peak buying period that is coming up.

Speaking to the Managing Director of JB Hi Fi, Richard Uechtritz has this to say "There bullying is coming back to bite them. This is one product that Harvey Norman wanted and I believe that a lot of vendors will take note of what Nintendo have done in refusing to accept Harvey Normans terms". This is certainly an interesting turn of events and one most Australians will have an opinion on. Source: SmartHouse