CR's new ranking of tire retailers

Mavis is no longer the worst-rated. :wink:
They actually look “okay”… when compared to Walmart & Pep Boys.

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You’ll have to summarize without copyright infringement. I’m no longer a member and not going to join again to get beyond the paywall. I will say though that regardless of what they come up with, I just rely on my local Goodyear dealer who also sells other brands.

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They ranked Goodyear Auto Service #10 out of 20 retailers.
“Independents” were ranked #1 in their reader survey, Costco was ranked as #7, Firestone Complete Auto Care was #16, Mavis was #18, followed by Walmart, and Pep Boys was in bottom-of-the-barrel 20th place.

That’s exactly where Walmart and Pep Boys belong.

How many chain store stores do they check and where, major city’s or small town city’s all states or just one or two states for locations… Cause I know of some stores in middle Tn that would rank #1 if only they were checked, on the downside I also know some stores in middle Tn that would rank 30th place out of the top 20 retailers… :rofl: :astonished:

Just saying…

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The people of Pep Boys and Walmart will be proud to be included in the top twenty tire dealers.

“They” don’t check any stores themselves. This is the outcome of CR’s annual reader survey. Because those readers are dispersed all around the country, I think it’s fair to say that the tire dealers that were rated were in varied locations and in many/most states.

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I am in no way disputing the outcome, but just saying that a lot of independent shops are always asking the customers to give them good reviews (yelp, google etc) as that is their only or best forum of advertising being word of mouth whereas a large corporation is more interested in getting feed back from the customer on how they as a company are doing (BOSS view etc), not looking for the customer to do advertising for them as they run local and national commercials to do the advertising for them, and most of the happy people tend to be more silent but the complainers are the ones giving the bad feed back (yelp Google etc) away from the company, the squeaky wheel gets the grease…

I know when I owned my own shop (90’s) that it was all about word of mouth, but working for the man was all about telling Corp how good the Corp shop was doing so Corp would leave us alone…

I have multiple good Doctors that I have done many surveys for to help them out, but I have never done one for a Hospital unless I was really upset about something and just hoped someone would hear my vent, but knowing it wouldn’t make a hill of beans…

Point is the average person is often to busy with life to do surveys when everything is going well unless they are on a more personal level with the people they are doing business with, but tick someone off and they all of a sudden have plenty of time to complain about a Corp company…

The idiot mechanic (independent shop) that screwed the guy over on here with the rack-n-pinion would probably never have his (cough cough) shop customers surveyed, and what is the chance that CR will ever hear about FS taking care and going above and beyond (getting AZ to warranty a non warranty item due to improper install) to get the rack-n-pinion customer safely back on the road…

I also worked with a guy that was one of the company’s top ever Managing Partner Store manager, he was/is all about 100% customer satisfaction, if he couldn’t make you happy then you needed medication… lol
He retired and started his own independent shop and is doing VERY good, has won some city local rewards and has a 5 out of 5 star rating, but I bet CR never surveyed any of his customers or he would have been very close to if not #1… Bowles Complete Autocare & Tires in Gallatin, Tennessee… And any FS store he ever ran was the same way…

Just to throw some more gas on the fire on a hazy Saturday, but do you think the average cr subscriber is a good cross section of the general public? What type of person would be interested in subscribing to a publication called consumer reports? And then in addition, of those subscribers, the sub set that would actually fill out a report? So all in all, you have to consider the source of the data and the bias of that source. I’ve done business with the local Goodyear dealer for 40 years and never gotten bad advice from them. Just sayin is all.

I subscribed for a year or so and found the information of little value. I knew a guy that would not buy water melon for his kids because it was a waste of money. He would research to death everything he bought. I don’t think he subscribed though because he would read the reports for free at the post office before they were delivered. To be fair though I liked the guy and he had many other redeeming qualities. I just question the bias of subscribers.

I don’t know is Sam’s club was linked with Walmart or not.

I bought a set of tires from my nearest Sam’s. Not the cleanest or best organized shop. Not the best balancing job.

I bought a set for the Mustang and went to a Sam’s in the next city. The balance was perfect. That store shop was clean and well organized and the work reflected it.

Then, we have to consider what type of person thinks that subscribing to a publication called Consumer Reports is not a good idea…
:laughing:

They are rated separately from Wally World, in the #14 position. In other words, they are rated better than their parent corporation’s tire centers, but they are not exactly highly rated.

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Since I ordered exactly what I wanted online, I have no “sales experience” good or bad. If they get the wheels balanced and don’t scratch my wheels, I’m happy.

The past three sets of tires I’ve bought have been from Discount Tire/Tire Rack. They have two locations relatively close to me and they’ll price match anyone local, which means, they’ll price match Costco. No complaints at all so far. Tire Rack is owned by Discount Tire. Last set of tires, I ordered on Tire Rack and had them installed by Discount Tire. I’ve used Costco in the past and had no issue with them. BJ’s was okay, but nothing exceptional; I’ve had to wait an extra day or two for tires to be delivered there. The worst of all was a stand alone Firestone/Bridgestone store.

I never bought anything from them, but they talked my mom into a set of chinese-made garbage once (despite my warnings), and when two of the tires failed on the same day (which was odd), it became my problem, as I was voluntold to “go handle it”. The service at the store was abysmal. The guy whom I was talking to about it, and who was supposed to arrange for pro-rated replacements (these crap tires didn’t even have a warranty on the construction/workmanship and had about 5k miles on them). The guy looked at the tires, agreed they had failed due to structural failure, but the best he could do was to pro-rate the treadwear warranty. He said he was going to order the replacements and do the paperwork and for me to just hold tight. I held tight for two hours , at which point I flagged down another employee and asked where the guy was. She said, “Oh, he’s out road testing another customer’s car, and probably getting lunch”. I told her that I had been waiting for two hours. She said that she could help, and I retold the story, and she said that she would check to see if the replacement tires had been ordered. They hadn’t been, but the good news was that she could order them, and it would only be 5 work days before they would arrive. I told her that,that wasn’t going work for me, and asked if they could get any other model of tire sooner, she went to here computer and said I could get some Bridgestones there by the end of the day, but they were going to be $380 per tire + install, and mandatory extras which was going to end up costing a little over a grand for two tires. I told her that I wasn’t interested, and that I was just going to go elsewhere. So I drove the 5 miles to the BJ’s and got a set of Michelins (which was I told mom to do in the first place) for $1204 (mounted/balanced) and called it good. BJ’s didn’t have the tires in stock, but their supplier was able to get them to the store in about an hour. Needless to say, I left a scathing review of the Firestone, it was ridiculous.

Heh heh, just depends where you are I suspect. I went to discount tire some years ago because they were close to work. I had a rumble that I was trying to identify and they had an ad for either free rotation or balancing don’t remember. Took an hour or so of vacation time and waited and waited… so I said I’ll come back in the afternoon. Same deal waited and waited. Finally the guy asked what the tread depth was and they would do nothing if they were threes or under. I just left. Reminded me of aamco with a firmer shoe salesman in charge.

So a guy in Delaware may have a very different experience than a guy in Bloomington, so what good is the opinion of a consumer a couple thousand miles away?

Presumably from either Discount Tire or Tirerack?
They are ranked as #4 & #5, respectively.
I bought tires twice from Tirerack (winter tires mounted on their own dedicated steel rims), and I had a positive experience both times.

No, from Sam’s Club. Khumos for the truck and Michelin PS4S for the Mustang. Sam’s had the same prices as Tire Rack and Sams warranties them, offers free repairs and rotation.

Sams is owned by Walmart. I let my membership lapse though and just use Costco. I seem to recall the same products at Sams or Walmart but it’s been several years now.