I was fascinated to read a couple days ago about the possible split between Sears and their Craftsman tool brand. According to the story, Sears may reorganize into several separate companies, which could include splitting out the Craftsman and Die-Hard brands.

For decades, Craftsman has been synonymous with Sears as a well-regarded line of tools. It's been a steady traffic-driver to a store that has lost significant market share in other departments to "new" brands such as Wal-Mart, Target and others.

I'm very curious to see how this separation will manifest itself for Sears and for the individual brands, and what it will mean to both collective and individual sales. For example:

- Will we see Craftsman tools at Wal-Mart? Will that help sales volume and/or hurt the brand image?
- Will Sears sell other brands? If so, how does that differentiate Sears from Home Depot? Will they compete on price?

Lots of possible angles here.

What do you think - is a separation between Sears and Craftsman a good thing? How will it impact each brand?