It's not terribly surprising that soon-to-be Nintendo Switch owners might fund their purchase with old hardware they own, either currently unused or just hanging around. What's more surprising, however, are the numbers in which folks appear to be doing so. If recent data from Decluttr.com is anything to go by, trade-ins have proven to be an extremely popular method of Switch fundraising as of late.

Regarding the spike, Decluttr noticed the following pertaining to its customers' hardware trade-ins and the impending Nintendo Switch. The site's premise is one of trading "unwanted game consoles, CDs, DVDs, and books" for cash, so if anyone ought to know, it's them.



Decluttr.com has reported a spike in game console trade-ins leading up to this week’s launch of the Nintendo Switch. [In particular, it found] that trade-ins of gaming devices increased by 66 percent in the weeks leading up to the Switch release, with trade-ins of the New Nintendo 3DS XL and the Nintendo Wii U console growing by a record 70 percent.



Interestingly, trade-ins of the XBOX ONE and PlayStation 4 also increased by 38 percent and 43 percent respectively, marking the highest trade-in rate for both devices over the last 18 months.

Decluttr's marketing director Liam Howley also notes that despite seeing "steady growth" in 3DS and Wii U trade-ins since the holiday season, recent increases have brought trade-in totals to "unprecedented levels in the weeks leading to the Nintendo Switch launch." To be fair, the site is offering $90 and $105 bounties for 3DS XL and Wii U trade-ins respectively, so to call recent happenings purely organic would not be 100% accurate either. Still, that can't account for the PS4 and Xbox One boosts, so clearly the trade-in bug is currently contagious.

Nintendo Switch launches Friday March 3rd, so those looking to swap their Wii Us might want to do so before it's officially no longer the latest and greatest Nintendo machine. In my case, Switch only cost $75 thanks to several years worth of accumulated, unredeemed Amazon gift cards, but I acknowledge that such hoarding of small plastic sheets isn't exactly the norm.

Console Trade-Ins Have Hit Record Highs Leading Up To Nintendo Switch Launch - GameRevolution WATCH GALLERY

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