Some of your lesser brands are actually made by the bigger brands. Example - Cooper manufactures several sub-brands and private-label lines, including Mastercraft, Mickey Thompson, Starfire, Dean, and Roadmaster - just to name a few.
Over the years, I have had 100% positive experiences with both Michelins and Goodyears. My one experience with Continental was so bad that I wouldn’t own them again. My multiple experiences with Bridgestone were… mediocre… at best. My one experience with BFG was… decent.
The only experience with off-brand tires (because I knew that I would be trading-in my car in a few months) was… not great. These Falls brand tires squealed like a stuck pig when turning, even at low speed. Pedestrians would frequently look on in horror, as I think it sounded like a car skidding out of control, even though the tires weren’t skidding. I experimented with tire pressures, but nothing improved the squealing problem.
If a customer came into your Firestone store, and they said that their tires were 11 years old, wouldn’t you advise them to replace those tires a.s.a.p., or even… yesterday?
It’s possible the intention was to state that an 11-year-old tire, regardless of how often driven or not, is stil a 11-year-old tire. Chemical breakdowns in the rubber, some related to driving and local climate, some not, will start to happen even when the tire is 5 - let alone 11 - years old.
Extreme example: 1967 garage queen, last driven by the early '70s, alignment checked, and tire pressures kept on top of even long after bell-bottoms and vomit-brown appliances came and went, 
6mm of tread still present, are still nearly sixty year old tires.
Here is a shocker for you that I posted a few years back…
Like I said, the car is NOT driven often at all, it is now a back up of a back up basically… And I just checked their age the other day, time flies, so I have been looking for replacements, just not in any hurry cause again, not driven much anymore.. Now if it was still my DD, then they would have been replaced 2 years ago or more, while still working, tires were ALWAYS replaced ASAP…
And Yes you have heard me say MANY times on here that tires can become unsafe at 10 years of age…
I also said I WILL replace them once I find a suitable replacement…
Until then the car will be parked most of the time, it might be driven down the road about 30 to 40mph to Kroger’s that is 1/2mile from the house and a lot of that is still in the neighborhood (I can see it from the house)… Heck, the tires will never even get any heat build up in them… If the tires are bad enough when I finally go to replace them then I have the option of two trucks to haul them to my old work for replacement…
Next time I will just wright a dang book to read instead of the short version to make sure no one gets confused gezzzz…
BTW I did clearly say towards the beginning of that statement that " I am sad cause the tires on the wifey’s car have aged out," But I also edited in a few words to hopefully clean ANY confusion up…and added a warning…
They continually top the tyre tests in most facets.Get onto ‘Tyre reviews’ Brit guy in the US,does all the testing & reviews @ the Goodyear tyre test track in Texas.Highly recommended.
Talk about a ‘multi National’ family!
Think you need to watch before commenting.
I for one am not giving clicks to someone on Youtube for tire research .
Jonathon Benson is the real deal. But it is understandable because of the way this was presented that you would be reluctant. When the time comes that you’re ready to buy tires, give him a look..
back to the title of this post, yes some people will shop by price.
I once had a tire pickup a nail on the interstate. Changed it to my spare. The other tires were barely above the wear bars, the next exit was near a big box store, when there, got new tires for my Ranger pickup, it came with 70 series tires, but the store had 75s in stock, I don’t remember the brand, but they served me well. Did not worry about the effect on the speedometer. Had another case where my wife pickup a cone seashell in a tire, again other tires were nearing replacement. We were close to a Firestone dealer and a Cooper dealer, went with Coopers. I previously had a bad experience, not tire related, with that Firestone store.
When it come to tires, some people are loyal to one brand or another because of good prior experience. When I can preplan my purchase I search by the characteristics I need. In my case wet traction is number one. The last time I got tires for my truck, the Goodyears that came with the truck and Michelins were rated nearly the same, tried the Michelins this time to see if I could get more than 30K miles.
Car has Continentals. Michelin didn’t even show in the top three.
Off topic,but you still own a Capri? Had one decades ago.
For anyone keeping up (or cares in the least lol), I just had some new tires installed, they weren’t my 1st choice, but a still a great tire… FS is running one heck of a deal this week so I jumped all over them… lol
I researched the tires on Tire Rack 1st…
BRIDGESTONE TIRE PACKAGE:
019363 TURANZA EVERDRIVE BL 205/55R16 XL 94V 80,000 Mile Limited Warranty…
They will age out wayyy before they will wear out, but I was looking for an all season tire, traction in the rain was my main concern…
My 1st choice was a brand new tire with very high marks from Tire Rack (the EverDrive were just below it) and the tread looks the part, it would have been my 1st ever 3 peak tire, I had the store manager order them in and hide them, well one of the sales guys transferred them out to another store, it would have been today before I could get them and I was helping him out on a Sunday, my choice…
BRIDGESTONE TIRE PACKAGE:
015774 ULTRAWEATHER BL 205/55R16 91V 60,000 Mile Limited Warranty…
My son said the new tires handled the road very well and very smooth… Looking forward to his thoughts about the wet (rain) weather traction in the coming days…
The price of both tires are the same in store as well as at Tire Rack… I of course get my retired employee discount, so no one can beat my in store price on them, but others should shop around…
Anyway, ALL the tires in my little fleet are again very safe… 
As noted, practically all the Name Brand tire manufacturers have Second Tier or Retail Market brands which while not the “latest and greatest” technology are significantly less expensive but still well suited for most drivers.
For example Goodyear owns Cooper, Mastercraft, Mickey Thompson, Dunlop, Douglas and Kelly-Springfield, which for years made the Sears tire brands.
Likewise Continental owns General, Uniroyal, Semprit and a bunch of others.
Additionally, although the Brand may be “American” or “German”, the tires will be made wherever it’s cheapest. For example, my last set of Continental (German)/ General (US) tires were actually made in France and Serbia.
Domestically, the tire production will be relocated to wherever the labor costs are lowest and the State and Local spiffs are the highest. So let’s say you have a perfectly good plant in the Northeast or the Upper Midwest but Texas or South Carolina offers cheap labor, a “Tax Holiday”, Free Land, loose restrictions and various other spiffs, well that production is going to relocate regardless of how the current plant is performing.
The result is often the manufacturers playing one State against the other in a “race to the bottom”.
The Michelin X tires that came on my '74 Volvo were manufactured in Northern Ireland, so this is surely not a new trend.
Edited to add… I just remembered that Michelin had a factory in Milltown, NJ, dating back to 1911. The old-timers in my town remembered that the bus company that ran from Milltown to points West was used by Michelin to test their commercial tires for durability. The old-timers said that the last couple of rows of bus seats were replaced with large cast iron weights, so that the tires were subjected to more stress.
That factory was shut-down sometime during The Great Depression, but for at least a few decades, the US was a low-cost location for tire manufacturing.
I have great experiences using these on my trucks for many years. The first time I bought them, I was looking for some goodyears but they were not in stock and emails to the company yielded no response to when they would be doing their next run. So I bought the BFG All Terrain T/As and never looked back. Quiet running, excellent traction and long life. I could plow my driveway in 2WD with no ballast. What’s not to like? 