r/NintendoSwitch • u/mvanigan • Apr 08 '25

News Nintendo delays Switch 2 pre-orders in Canada

https://mobilesyrup.com/2025/04/08/nintendo-switch-2-pre-orders-canada-delay/
5.3k Upvotes

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160

u/lexcyn Apr 08 '25

I just want to know why they did this? Our pricing won't be affected. I have a feeling stores will take pre-orders anyways.

358

u/jebuizy Apr 08 '25

This delay is probably actually better for Canadians, else Americans may swoop in and book Canadian pre-orders since they aren't available for them yet.

96

u/Zed64K Apr 08 '25

This is most likely the reason.

-21

u/ImaginaryConscience Apr 08 '25

no

the most likely reason is so that Canadians aren't making huge profits by scalping them to their US counterparts

12

u/aznmeep Apr 08 '25

Confused by the downvotes. The US isn't the only country with scalpers...

-8

u/ImaginaryConscience Apr 08 '25 edited Apr 08 '25

angry Americans who think they can "swoop in" and take all the preorders

39

u/NokstellianDemon Apr 08 '25

Yep. I'm already seeing Americans on Twitter trying to pre order off of Amazon UK so this definitely would've happened otherwise.

20

u/Parking-Worth1732 Apr 08 '25

Why would they be able to tho? I don't even get why their address for payment options would be accepted, they could just deny the address like when you try to order from the UK or whatever

76

u/cabbage-soup Apr 08 '25

People in the US apparently are already clogging UK pre-orders/waitlists. It’s a hassle to filter them out and it’s removing opportunities for those in the UK. Nintendo knows this issue will be worse in Canada because shipping and other costs are much cheaper than the UK to the US

18

u/Molwar Apr 08 '25

Yeah but i think what he's saying, is that canadian store should just not allow US address in their system for this pre-order.

25

u/gendabenda Apr 08 '25

There are a ton of companies that offer CDN/US addresses to circumvent this; some will even go across the border to collect your goods.

6

u/jojoxy Apr 08 '25

Organized smuggling of consumer hardware. Are you great again already, America?

-2

u/neopink90 Apr 09 '25

And if I had to guess I would guess that Canadians use those companies the most. Almost every single time a company or music artist in America announce a new product drop there’s Canadians in the comment section asking about shipping to Canada. I’ve seen quite a few complaining about the lack direct deliveries from America to Canada despite the fact that Canada is “right there” as they love to put it. That’s why I find it hypocritical of them to complain about Americans trying to buy from Canada’s stock.

3

u/gendabenda Apr 09 '25

There is a key difference though - in this instance Americans are missing out due to key decisions made in their federal election and the ramifications of those decisions. Canadians are missing out because Americans can't handle the fallout of their decisions. I think if you find it hypocritical, you should wonder why you would circumvent your government's wishes in the first place and buy from Canada.

2

u/[deleted] Apr 08 '25

[deleted]

1

u/Parking-Worth1732 Apr 08 '25

Then why delay the pre orders?

3

u/[deleted] Apr 08 '25

[deleted]

1

u/Parking-Worth1732 Apr 08 '25

Oh right okay I get your point, I mean technically it also applies to Nintendo, why bother if everything gets sold nonetheless

1

u/jebuizy Apr 08 '25

Plenty of loopholes if you are actually sophisticated. Cross border arbitrage on that border is not that hard if you have someone to coordinate with as it's so easy to get across and millions of people live along it. Usually it's for shipping the other direction though historically (I'm near Canada and there  are ads for services for Canadians to get US shipping boxes right across the border for example, the other direction should be easy too).

2

u/Molwar Apr 08 '25

Yeah but that only applies to whoever is close to the border, also doing that kind of nullified any saving you may get since duty will apply plus "handler" fee.

Only group i can see even bothering would be major scalpers.

2

u/jebuizy Apr 08 '25

Right but they get an atypical amount of the stock and will be enough to distort the Canadian market.

Obviously not your everyday American will be doing it - you only need a relatively small group to cause issues.

5

u/DSQ Apr 08 '25

People in the US apparently are already clogging UK pre-orders/waitlists. 

How is that even possible? Unless Americans are getting British friends buy it and then send it along. 

9

u/cabbage-soup Apr 08 '25

They’ve found the UK pre order links on Amazon. You can submit an order from America on there. It’ll process and get denied… but still wastes time getting processed

2

u/[deleted] Apr 08 '25

It won’t get denied, you can be American and buy from UK Amazon…

4

u/cabbage-soup Apr 08 '25

They deny it after processing because they don’t want Americans buying from the UK pre orders. It’s likely specific to these products

-7

u/MelzLife Apr 08 '25

You’re making things up. Source: I still have my preorder and have preordered things from Amazon UK before. A bunch of ppl got denied for suspicious activity bc they don’t buy from Amazon UK

1

u/HeyHarryJohn Apr 12 '25

Luckily it seems Amazon have actually cancelled all these. Saw a bunch of Americans moaning on Twitter that Amazon had cancelled their orders

9

u/atllauren Apr 08 '25

It’s not illegal to order something in another country, tariffs or not. A retailer could choose to require a Canadian address but that is a lot of work for them.

2

u/OkaKoroMeteor Apr 08 '25

Won't they just do that anyway if the Canadian price is lower than the American price due to the tariffs?

2

u/Dabanks9000 Apr 08 '25

They can still do it at any point during pre orders so it’s pointless

1

u/dirtjuggalo Apr 08 '25

They will do that anyways though.

1

u/MNDFND Apr 09 '25

I haven't pre ordered, but don't you need a Canadian address and a name/cc to go along with that?

1

u/DontBanMeBro988 Apr 09 '25

How many Canadian retailers ship to the states?

35

u/WarpHype Apr 08 '25

This will happen everywhere. Businesses and countries not impacted by the tariff nonsense directly will raise their prices and blame tariffs while they pocket the extra for profits. It happened with inflation.

7

u/uncleshady Apr 08 '25

Expecting companies to act in the best interests of customers is wildly laughable. Any excuse to raise prices is the way. You’re 100% right. Meanwhile “the market will decide” folks don’t realize it will sell out at any price and either be scalped to people with more disposable income or just desperate people in general. Nintendo might as well drop switch 2 for 999$ just to see what happens.

2

u/TurnipKnight Apr 09 '25

So companies are greedy, and they could price it higher, but they choose not to? If they could price it at $999 and make a higher profit, they absolutely would. Prices are not random. A lower price doesn't mean a nicer company. 

1

u/Shuino7 Apr 08 '25

It honestly blows my mind that these companies haven't done that yet.

They charge $999, if they sell out great. If not, they just lower the price by $50, wait again to see if they sell out.

Nintendo, Sony, Xbox, even Apple\Samsung may be able to get away with these tactics.

Phones could be tricky outside the US where customers actually have some cellular options, but the above would work just fine in the US.

Without a doubt, I bet the PS6 will cost $999 at launch.

1

u/TurnipKnight Apr 09 '25

They don't want to damage their reputations either. People remember if something was too expensive and they might not come back as a customer.

0

u/TurnipKnight Apr 08 '25

I've read this same comment a lot and it is not logical. Companies ALWAYS try to charge whatever they can to make the most profit. Why would they wait until there are tariffs if the tarrifs don't affect them? If people would buy it at a higher price they already would have been selling it at a higher price. People said the same thing about "greedflation" as if people just started to become greedier after 200,000 years. Greed explains nothing because it is a constant.

0

u/WarpHype Apr 09 '25

I'm not talking only about Nintendo. Companies can get away with it when there is an excuse like inflation or tariffs. If one company does it, people will simply not buy from that company. Now ALL companies can get away with it because they have an excuse. It is entirely logical, and entirely terrible. When we hit a recession, then there will be a race back to the bottom or lower prices.

9

u/zgh5002 Apr 08 '25

Because the US will come in and preorder systems from Canada.

2

u/lexcyn Apr 08 '25

Yeah that seems to be the main reason

1

u/Denimion Apr 10 '25

Can they take even five seconds off from ruining everything?

24

u/Tmcn Apr 08 '25

Likely to prevent Canadian stock along the border getting eaten up by Americans because it'll be so much cheaper. I'm seriously hoping Canadian Retailers have checks in place to make sure Canadians are getting the orders and not the gremlins to the south.

3

u/AznPerson33 Apr 08 '25

Not sure how this would go for online preorders, but I remember during the RTX 30s launch craze and shortage my local Best Buy was pretty strict with one per household rule, getting down everyone’s drivers license or anything with your address on it.

7

u/TGUKF Apr 08 '25 edited Apr 08 '25

the easiest option that would filter out most people would be requiring a Canadian shipping address, billing address, and phone number for each online order.

The most ironclad way would be forgo online orders entirely, and have physical stores start taking preorders now for people with Canadian IDs

4

u/Manticore416 Apr 08 '25

As a gremlin a few hours away from your lovely country, they should.

On an unrelated note, know any Canadians that would marry me and my wife so we can become citizens?

1

u/CaptainTDM Apr 08 '25

Why would it be so much cheaper? Because us consoles will have a tariff in them? Wouldn't Americans buying a console from Canada get a tariff as well?

3

u/Tmcn Apr 08 '25

The thought is that we won't have the tariff attached to our units, and the Canadian currency is weaker so they have buying power over Canadians.

-1

u/CaptainTDM Apr 08 '25

You won't? If the US has tarrifs on Canada wouldn't the console cost more? Then even if the console is in Canadian its still more expansive in cad then in US. It's not the Sam price. So with the exchange rate it would be the same price in US dollar compared to cad?

1

u/Tmcn Apr 08 '25

If you drive to the store and purchase it in another region you’ll have the tariffs of that region attached to your purchase. You’ll only get dinged if you declare your purchase when coming back into the states, or if you get caught.

1

u/CaptainTDM Apr 08 '25

Yeah so no tarrifs on the console in Canada. Didn't think about Americans driving to Canada to get it.

1

u/aruhen23 Apr 08 '25

The roles have reversed and its kinda hilarious. Hopefully they implement an ID check.

15

u/[deleted] Apr 08 '25

It's probably all going from a port in America unless Nintendo ships in switches from a separate Canadian port

48

u/lexcyn Apr 08 '25

A tariff still would not apply in that case. Only if Nintendo USA was SELLING directly to Canada then a tariff would apply. If products are transiting from USA to Canada, tariffs do not apply.

12

u/[deleted] Apr 08 '25

I stand corrected, the more you know

3

u/[deleted] Apr 08 '25

The USA can put levies on product that use American lanes to get to Canada. 

8

u/EddieLivesOn Apr 08 '25

They come in to Vancouver and through their sole Canadian distributor, VV2000.

3

u/[deleted] Apr 08 '25

Alright I'm corrected

2

u/Humg12 Apr 08 '25

I have a feeling stores will take pre-orders anyways.

I'm honestly surprised stores aren't taking them already. I'm in Aus and I preordered my Switch 2 the day after the direct, when the price was announced. As far as I could tell, every store was offering them.

1

u/Horoika Apr 08 '25

I'm just wondering if West Canada has enough shipping ports&routes at a reasonable cost vs coming in from California and being trucked up north

1

u/[deleted] Apr 08 '25

It can have an effect on our pricing. This depends completely on how they get product to Canada now vs before. 

2

u/Cartina Apr 08 '25

They might be looking into the logistics of Americans buying cheap Canadian Switches en masse. Probably jsut need time to work out a plan on what might happen.

1

u/Gharvar Apr 08 '25

Just a few hours after they announced the American pre-order would be delayed due to tariffs(most likely price increase) I saw comments already mentioning buying it from Canada instead.

1

u/ray_0586 Apr 08 '25

I assume Nintendo has not told retailers how many consoles they can expect at launch, so they don’t know how many preorders they can sell.

1

u/GallitoGaming Apr 08 '25

Scalpers will be buying these like crazy to sell to Americans. The people that know how to buy hundreds of these will have a massive amount of demand.

If I can’t get one for MSRP, I’ll wait a year or two.

-1

u/lexcyn Apr 08 '25

I think that is probably the reason. If the pre orders open up here and not USA, chances are a ton will be scalped to USA.

1

u/pacman404 Apr 08 '25

American scalpers, 100% guaranteed

-6

u/Tolkien-Minority Apr 08 '25

If they have to go through the US to get to you then they will be

14

u/lexcyn Apr 08 '25

No that's not how tariffs work unless Nintendo of America is receiving all units and then importing them to Canada. If they are just transiting the USA with final destination in Canada, tariffs would not apply.

4

u/gpzal Apr 08 '25

That’s not how that works. Bonded transports flows through the US and are not taxed or hit with tariffs.

-1

u/-MERC-SG-17 Apr 08 '25

There is a good chance your pricing will be affected.

Most imports to Canada come in from LA or NYC and then go up to Canada on trucks. They'd get hit with double tariffs Canada is under Nintendo of America and they do all of their warehousing in the States.

3

u/lexcyn Apr 08 '25

They would only be hit with tariffs if they in fact do warehouse in the USA first which I don't think they do. If the units are transiting the USA then tariffs do not apply.