There is always a lot of talk about intangibles when marketing people start talking about branding; after all, much of the power of a brand is difficult to measure at any particular time. 

Of course, there are some moments when the opposite occurs, when the value of a brand is easily measured. One of those moments kicked off yesterday, and continues unabated today. The “Missoni for Target” collection was launched yesterday at 6 AM Eastern Time online on the main Target.com site, and demand was so intense that the main site crashed. 

"Target.com is seeing greater item demand than we do on a typical Black Friday, and the excitement for this limited-time designer collection is unprecedented," the store said in a statement. "We are slowly bringing the site back online to ensure we can provide a positive shopping experience to our guests." 

Almost all of Tuesday afternoon and through the evening, the Target homepage displayed an auto-page of the Target bull terrier informing would-be shoppers that the site was down. 

“We are suddenly extremely popular”, read the statement on the courtesy page. 

The site was back up and completely functional by this morning (Wednesday) 8 AM Eastern Time, but by then, many of the items in the collection were completely sold out. Angry customers spilled vitriol out against Target on Twitter and blogs. By this afternoon, there were 100 comments on a NYTimes.com blog post about the site, most of which were critical of Target, and only paid subscribers to the New York Times are allowed to comment on their posts, so those 100 comments were truly only a smidgen of the people that wished to write a comment. 

The situation was the same in the retail stores out in the real world, with shoppers lined up before Target stores opened, and selling out of the Missoni items almost immediately. 

This brings us to today (09-14-2011) and the aforementioned continuance of a tangible display of brand power. 

The secondary market for the Missoni items bought yesterday from Target is eBay and Craigslist, and the resale prices for the now-unavailable products are booming, to say the least. 

A men’s black sweater that retailed online for $49.99 was being offered on Craigslist in NYC for $235.00. A women’s sweater dress from the collection that retailed for $39.99 yesterday is now being offered for $275 as used clothing on eBay. A classic zigzag patterned throw that sold yesterday for 39.99 at Target is now being sold for around $200.00 on Craigslist. A $29.99 Famiglia Train bag was offered for $150 on Craigslist in Washington, D.C. A three-speed cruiser bike decked out in Missoni patterns, which is being hawked on both eBay and Craigslist for approximately $1500, sold for less than 25% of that price from Target just 24 hours ago. 

Target’s price points for the Missoni goods are lower than other retailers’ price points, albeit at what many would say is a lower-quality level. As an example, a Missoni sweater at Target that would sell for $49.99 and be made from synthetic materials might have a counterpart made from silk sold at Neiman-Marcus for $900. But that has not deterred the Target shoppers; they see an opportunity to get a luxury brand with iconic style on the cheap, and even at the inflated secondary-market prices on eBay or Craigslist, those items still look like a bargain to them.