I can’t really remember because it was ages ago but I think we actually got a load of empty boxes from the warehouse specifically for display, they weren’t just boxes that had the consoles removed they were display boxes. They didn’t have a barcode on them.
I remember doing that with a couple of “big” things in the 2000s. Bring the box to the counter and they swap it for a real one. A console was probably one of them, I can’t remember what the others might have been
I worked at a big retail place in my country when I grew up, and we never had empty boxes for stuff. I did use… I dunno what you call it, but the metal wires with the crank that you need a magnet key to take off? Those were put on small, expensive things like a Raptor HDD. Consoles never got those though, because they’re big and not easy to conceal.
This would have been Best Buy or Toys R Us, I was a just a kid so I don’t remember if it was common or not.
But that did make me remember something from my time at a grocery store! Sometimes when there was a huge sale on coca cola, we’d build a giant display that was mostly fake. The center was a heavy duty plain box and we’d stack the fake ones on top where people couldn’t reach. Just the front columns. Not really the same thing but kinda!
The only time there were shortages of anything was during black friday (which people went feral for) or maybe for one or two days during the debut of a super famous highly anticipated product (like, the next iPhone, that level of famous).
The only things that were scalped for months on end like they are now were concert tickets.
I’m pretty sure that when I bought my Wii it was just on the shelf as well, granted this was less than a year after it came out (so ancient history at this point) and my memory could be incorrect.
Eh, a bit of an exaggeration. I think they were just old inventory and undesired at the time, hence the price and lack of security measures
Prob right after Wii came out. No need when Wii could play GC games
I actually remember around 07 there being a big display of PS3s at BestBuy you could just grab the box.
That said they may have been empty displays but my memory tells me they had some weight to them.
I used to spend a lot of time at Bestbuy playing Guitar Hero with randos :)
I can’t really remember because it was ages ago but I think we actually got a load of empty boxes from the warehouse specifically for display, they weren’t just boxes that had the consoles removed they were display boxes. They didn’t have a barcode on them.
This would have been for the Xbox 360 and PS3.
I remember doing that with a couple of “big” things in the 2000s. Bring the box to the counter and they swap it for a real one. A console was probably one of them, I can’t remember what the others might have been
I worked at a big retail place in my country when I grew up, and we never had empty boxes for stuff. I did use… I dunno what you call it, but the metal wires with the crank that you need a magnet key to take off? Those were put on small, expensive things like a Raptor HDD. Consoles never got those though, because they’re big and not easy to conceal.
This would have been Best Buy or Toys R Us, I was a just a kid so I don’t remember if it was common or not.
But that did make me remember something from my time at a grocery store! Sometimes when there was a huge sale on coca cola, we’d build a giant display that was mostly fake. The center was a heavy duty plain box and we’d stack the fake ones on top where people couldn’t reach. Just the front columns. Not really the same thing but kinda!
Yeah, at least where I lived, everything was in constant supply and nobody had issues with sold out stock/scalpers until the Wii came out.
This is my memory as well.
The only time there were shortages of anything was during black friday (which people went feral for) or maybe for one or two days during the debut of a super famous highly anticipated product (like, the next iPhone, that level of famous).
The only things that were scalped for months on end like they are now were concert tickets.
I’m pretty sure that when I bought my Wii it was just on the shelf as well, granted this was less than a year after it came out (so ancient history at this point) and my memory could be incorrect.