If you walk onto the Western Washington University campus, you will undoubtedly see numerous girls walking around with their skinny jeans tucked into a pair of faux-suede Uggs, or Ugg look-alikes. While these “rain boots” are the current fashion trend across America, this reporter is having trouble figuring out why.
After seeing these not-so-stylish boots around for over a year, I finally broke down and bought myself a pair, since my rain shoes consisted of ballet flats and my Converse Chuck Taylors. While I originally looked at getting myself a pair of authentic Australian Uggs, the retail price of $144 on Zappos.com was a bit steep for my college-kid budget--I went for a Wal-Mart knock off for $12.
Before I decided to go with the pair from Wal-Mart, I shopped around to get an idea of the quality differences between the Wal-Mart $12 shoes and the pricey Jung+G Fashion shoes for $50. Although I’m no cobbler, they all seemed to be about the same, minus various color options.
My first complaint is that these boots are terribly designed. It is almost impossible to find a size that fits. Your usual size will be able to fit your foot snugly in them, but the leg won’t be able to accommodate your pants. A size or two bigger will fit your pants, but your foot will have a lot of wiggle room. I think it would be beneficial to widen the leg a bit to fix this problem. I purchased a size eight instead of my usual size seven to fit my pants between the boot and my leg.
It took a good 10 minutes to get my pants shoved in the boots far enough that my feet were in the foot part of the boot instead of the leg. Then I noticed the seam along the top of the boot had already started to fray (most likely just a Wal-Mart issue). Already frustrated and late, I ran out to catch the bus to campus.
While trying to run, my feet were constantly moving around in the boot and caused me to miss-step a number of times. Add this to rainy weather and you get a girl stumbling down the sidewalk to catch the bus while frantically trying to stay upright.
A big difference you will find with the Uggs and the look-alikes are the soles. The Ugg soles are rubberized and grooved to help you maintain traction, while the look-alikes use foam soles with little grooving or grip to help you out. This turned out to be just as much of a problem as the fit.
As I got on the bus my foot slipped on the stairs, causing me to face plant into the person standing in front of me. I apologized and quickly found my seat, noticing the water already seeping through my socks. When getting off the bus I made sure to step carefully and had no problems, assuming it was just because of my rush that I had slipped earlier. Unfortunately, as soon as I stepped off the brick-laid path up to the Communications Facility onto the smooth concrete I slipped again.
This time, my feet went completely out from under me and I managed to end up face down in a puddle. A few people stopped to help me up and asked if I was all right. One guy kindly informed me “It’s slippery, you should watch your step.” (No, really?) Already embarrassed, I simply thanked him and said I’d keep that in mind.
Sitting here now, soaking wet and disgruntled, I think my $12 could have been spent on something else. Even if the boots had better traction, the design makes them hard to walk in and they provide very little protection from the rain and puddles that surround Western’s campus. Maybe the $144 authentic Uggs would be better, but I don’t plan on spending that kind of dough on shoes that don’t even look that great.