Nintendo announced today that the Wii will be available only in white at launch.

"This simplicity allows us to maximize volume throughout the Americas with simplicity and a continuous flow of product to minimize out-of-stocks," says Nintendo of America President and Chief Operating Officer Reggie Fils-Aime.

This is great for Nintendo and its retailers and distributors' inventory management and the few consumers who have entertainment centers or TV stands that work well with white products, but for most consumers a white Wii is an appliance that sticks out in a bad way.

Surely there will be Wiis in other colors eventually. New colors are a way to reverse declining sales of a  product. Nintendo has used this technique with previous hardware and has displayed Wiis in multiple colors at earlier press events.

But is restricting the Wii to a single color at launch a good business decision for Nintendo?

We expect the Wii console to be released in additional colors at later dates. How many consumers will choose not to purchase Wiis at launch only because they want theirs in colors that are not white?

I might be one of those consumers. The Wii's unique motion-sensitive, modular game controller has made me more excited about the console than I have been about any game system since the original Nintendo Entertainment System, but I don't want to pay $250 for a white Wii only to later lust after a black one, possibly spending an additional $250 to end that lust.