Former Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aimé said Nintendo stopped selling Wii and DS consoles to Amazon in the late 2000s or early 2010s after an Amazon executive demanded financial support so the retailer could undercut Walmart on price. Fils-Aimé said he told the executive, "You know that's illegal? I can't do that," and later recalled, "Literally we stopped selling to Amazon, and it's because I wasn't going to do something illegal." [1, 2, 3]
He said Amazon wanted an "obscene amount of support, financial support, so they could have the lowest price and beat Walmart." Nintendo sold about 10 million Wii and DS units a year in the Americas at the time, giving the talks real commercial weight. Fils-Aimé said he would not risk relations with other retailers by agreeing to the demand. [1, 3]
The dispute came near the end of the Wii and DS generation, when Nintendo was still one of the biggest names in games and Amazon was pushing hard on price. Fils-Aimé said the company drew a line because it would not accept terms it saw as illegal or unfair to other retail partners. [1, 2, 3]
Nintendo and Amazon later repaired the relationship. By the time the original Nintendo Switch launched in 2017, Amazon was supporting the system's debut on mutually beneficial terms, Fils-Aimé said. [1]
Tensions resurfaced around 2024 and 2025, with rumors that Nintendo products had been pulled from Amazon and that third-party resellers were blocked. Nintendo denied the claims, and the companies resumed normal business in June 2025. [2, 3]
