But i think flashcards are a different market though. People who want it are searching for it and mining information from the internet about it, as your store cant help you with it. So people who can buy it now, will buy it anyway if they released it later, so they are just gaining sales ( i think)
I always wondered if the flashcard market is also affected by holiday seasons? ( i assume it is a little bit, but percentage against the total 3ds use wise)
It is affected by it, and its significantly affected by it.
The thing is, during holiday seasons people splurge more than normal. So, if you have that little bit of extra cash - its gonna get spent during that holiday period.
While it is true that someone looking to buy a flash card and wants to do so informed will "wait" - thats only a part of your sales.
Just looking at the replies here alone I've seen half a dozen people coming past to ask for advice which flash card to get for their *child*.
Not only does this imply that the person talking may not always be the most informed (atleast on this particular topic), and thus relies on the information of others rather than their own search. But also that the ultimate user is a younger individual. And when do you buy presents for your kid? -> The holiday season.
A secondary effect is the indirect one. As you say, the flashcards themselves are a bit of an underground market, you don't just go to your local cornerstore and buy them.
But who buys a flashcard? Well clearly someone who owns a 3DS (XL) - and it just so happens that handhelds are a reasonably common holiday gift.
So, we have a lot of people buying handhelds and limited pocketmoney to spend. Majority audience not going to "wait" post-season for a gift.
When is your best bet to sell?
Do you really think that Timmy will be happy with a Gateway for Christmas if its not yet functional? Or is daddy-dearest going to be more inclined to put the holiday credits on a SKY3DS instead and judge that the 10-game-limit is an acceptable compromise? Afterall, 10 games are more than (n)one.
When you consider the group that is "in the know", you're ignoring the majority audience out there.
And that also works for more shady markets like flash cards.