Croc toast.

On Saturday I said that "I don't get flip-flops." That sentiment goes for Crocs as well. Generally, I don't know why anyone would want to wear a shoe with no back, held to your foot by only a thin strap.

I never figured out the Crocs either. A hunk of rubber that you have to shuffle your feet to keep them attached. They were popular. Were. I think their popularity had something to do with nurses wearing them in hospitals. How that translated to people wearing them in public is beyond me. Now finally, it appears that the company is struggling.

Last year the company lost $185.1 million, slashed roughly 2,000 jobs and scrambled to find money to pay down millions in debt. Now it's stuck with a surplus of shoes, and its auditors have wondered if it can stay afloat. It has until the end of September to pay off its debt.

"The company's toast," said Damon Vickers, who manages an investment fund at Nine Points Capital Partners in Seattle. "They're zombie-ish. They're dead and they don't know it."

They're blaming their collapse on the economy. That's what fringe companies do when things go bad. They blame the weather, gas prices, inflation or some other outside force. Anything but consumer intelligence, which I think is the case here. Sheep consumers latched onto a strange fashion statement, completely disregarding the tidal wave of hype that washed over them. Once they came to their senses (i.e. the shoes wore out) they realized how silly they had behaved.

Goodbye Crocs. You're going the way of the Nehru jacket, the Leisure Suit and Capri pants as things people will look at and say, "We wore that?"