Target out of Tums? Try Trojans instead.

Consumerist has covered Target’s past product substitutions – from telling customers that a flash drive is comparable to a flash bulb, or to just buy a mirror instead of that scale you were looking for. But this one takes the cake: Reader LB alerted me that Target is now suggesting you buy some Trojan condoms when your favorite cherry flavor of Tums is out of stock.

Why does Target do this? Well the intent is to offer customers a comparable item at the same price when something unexpectedly sells out. A Target employee once gave Consumerist this explanation: “A substitution isn’t a real substitution; it’s Target’s way of saying “we have no more of this, and we have a rain check for you, but we’re going to immediately put something else on sale that you might also enjoy.’ Stores actually get graded on how many substitutions are attached to rain checks. The more substitutions, the higher the score, and the higher the score ranks in their region.”

But obviously, not all Target Team Members take the substitution process seriously, which is why this particular one may be a case of a Target employee messing with us. As shown in this thread on Reddit (where the photo first surfaced) several Target Team Members comment that they purposely sub “the first thing I see out of laziness” or deliberately “pick the weirdest sub I can.”