Target has their own line of cheapass baby stuff from China, called Circo. If you go into a Target store, most of the baby-oriented products they have are either Circo brand or “Just One Year,” a Carter’s line also exclusive to Target.
I pretty much hate the Circo brand crap. All of the crib sheets sold at Target are Circo brand. If you look up reviews on these, they are notorious for being too small, and/or shrinking like crazy. I can get them on Cory’s bed, but it’s a fight. I bought a couple of their waterproof plastic sheets too, one of which I already had to throw away months ago after only the second washing, since it was cracking and falling apart. Yes! I followed the washing instructions.
But my favorite crappy item and the one I would like to feature here is the alleged sippy cup.
The Circo alleged sippy cup. Note the position of the handles relative to the spout.
First off, no matter how many times you try screwing the top on, it never lines up so that the handles are on either side of the spout. If this is hard to make out from the photo, try to imagine drinking out of the spout of a pitcher while holding the handle. Except that there’s also a handle on the other side, in front of your face. Although the cup is not lined up exactly on the vertical either, it’s kinda like that.
Genius.
I decided to try it a few times anyway, when Cory was about 6-7 months old, but it seemed like for some reason he just didn’t get the idea of the sippy cup. So I put his juice in a bottle for a while instead. When I decided recently that it might be time to try it again, it occurred to me to see if this was actually a mechanical problem, so I tried sucking on the sippy cup myself.
Hahaha. It is nearly impossible to suck hard enough on this cup to get anything out of it. Your head would implode first. Once we bought a different cup (which Cory has not had any trouble with btw), I found out that the Circo cup doesn’t work because the valve in it is made of hard plastic instead of silicone as it is in its more operational competitors. Because hard plastic is so much cheaper, y’know. And – and this is the key for Target – you don’t have much choice and you don’t know it’s nonfunctional crap until it’s too late. The business is made on people buying stuff for baby showers, things that might not be used for months (which was the case here), or fails only after it’s washed – and parents who simply don’t have the time and energy to deal with the hassle of trying to return things or complain. And it’s almost all they sell.
I hate Circo stuff and I am starting to hate Target.