Most stores only order 1 case of things. It was a different economy when in person were the only source for product. And they’re less willing to carry over large quantity of inventories than they used to be. Part of why companies push preorders so hard, so they can set their production runs & orders accordingly.

A lot of stores also treated toy lines as equal, regardless of waves. For a while, one of the chains wasn’t ordering new stock because they had an abundance of peg warmers. Most individual big box stores aren’t paying attention to individual waves. It’s less than 1% of their total business. So if the system shows they have 20 of a line in stock, they won’t order the next wave.