Missoni Madness at Target
Caroline Wolfe Papocchia Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 9:01AM 
What happens when you take an extremely high-end design house, pair it with a respected discount big box store, and spend thousands of dollars creating and promoting the result of that collaboration in the middle of a deepening recession?
Mayhem, apparently.
This is what retail giant Target experienced yesterday when it began selling Missoni for Target items in it's nationwide stores and online. The stores sold out of merchandise within minutes and the website crashed for almost the entire day. Shoppers on the site had items removed from their shopping carts while they were checking out.
The Target in Brooklyn, NY - the only store in New York City - may have set a record: all Missoni items were gone with 15-20 minutes of opening. Vituperations on Twitter indicated the story was much the same around the country, and had Target scrambling to create a cohesive customer service response.
Around 1:00 pm a woman at the Brooklyn location, who had scoured the returns desk for remainders and was bent over her shopping cart like a beautiful Golum, said the stores in her Nebraska hometown were also sold out. She added a common sentiment: "I love bright colors and crazy patterns like Missoni's but I didn't think everyone else did too."
Target vastly underestimated the frenzy for the Missoni line, and of the success of their whisper, talk, shout pre-launch campaign. The Pop-Up store created for New York's Fashion's Night Out was supposed to be open from Thursday through Sunday, but the merchandise did not make it past, well, the first hour it was open.
Target is an experienced retailer, and has collaborated successfully with designers in the past. Missoni is known for their bright colors, retro/modern palettes, and frenetic patterns. It is not a mainstream luxury brand.
So how did this happen?
Was it the pre-sale marketing, advertising, and promotion?
Was it the economy and people's desire to "get a bargain?"
Was it something about Missoni, a brand that usually sells for many thousands of dollars?
We don't know, and we doubt that Target does either, although even with their failures yesterday they are surely pleased with this fait accompli a day before the government reports that retail sales in August were flat.
What do you think??
What do you think of the 24,000+ Missoni for Target items now for sale on Ebay?
And how many designers are knocking on Target's doors these days? ;)
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Reader Comments (15)
Mayhem, apparently.
I hope it doesn't catch on too quickly.
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