This past week Sony has been chartering flights of Boeing 747s in order to bring PS5 consoles into the UK. The company has struggled to meet demands for the PlayStation 5 around the world. Three planes full of PS5 consoles have flown into the UK in the past week. Each plane has carried up to around 50 pallets of the consoles. That’s 12 full trucks worth of consoles for each plane flown in.
Sony has chartered the planes from South Korea to London in order to try and meet the demand for the PS5 in time for the holiday period. Sony has been struggling to meet the demand for the PS5 since it was first released a year ago. Due to supply chain restrictions and unprecedented demand for the console, Sony has been unable to get consoles on shelves. PS5 consoles still sell out the instant they are listed online and are frequently resold for much higher prices.
Normally, items like the PS5 will be shipped by sea as it is much cheaper and supply chains usually ensure that stock is available where it is needed. Due to the pandemic, supply chains have been impacted along with production capacity. There have been massive delays at shipping ports around the world over the past year. The backlog in China has been particularly severe. Sony could be taking the more expensive option of flying consoles in to get around the shipping delays that have been building.
As Nintendo and Microsoft also struggle to meet the demand for their consoles, the holiday period is shaping up to be a very uncertain time for console makers and gamers alike. The holiday period is by far the most important time of year for the big three console manufacturers. There’s no doubt they will be doing everything they can to meet demand. Even if that means specially flying consoles around the world to get them in the hands of gamers.
