This is a tough question to answer, because I need to know what in your mind “the same for practical purposes” means. As an engineer, my job was to figure out how to arrange these kinds of things to the advantage of the company.
Look at what davesmopar wrote. That was the tip of the iceberg. With bar codes, tires can be individually identified and in every step of the process graded and segregated.
And don’t forget that it is possible to use UV paint, which humans can’t see without UV light.
Capri:
So, regular-Chris goes to his local Goodyear or Town Fair store to buy a new round of tires for his car.
I’m probably going to go for a regular brand name tire: BF Goodrich, Continental, Goodyear, or Pirelli. Michelin is just too expensive for me.
How can I ensure the set I get from one of those brands are not “Black Friday” tires, or, a model made specifically for the discount tire market, such as Costco or DiscounTire themselves?
I would also want the freshest four tires available:
E.G.: If I’m buying new tires next week, I’d rather have ones stamped ‘1725’ on them, than have 3023 or such. 17th week of 2025 for those just joining or lurking this conversation.
I bought a set of Michelin X Tour All Season tires from Costco. They look similar to Defender but cost less. I purchased them during a rebate promotion.
I don’t put so much thought into a tire purchase, stick with popular brands.
How long does it take you guts to select a bottle of beer?
I don’t drink alcohol.
I have never seen the so-called Costco and WalMart exclusives listed on the tire manufacturer’s website
Be sure to mention this upfront. You will come across as a troublesome customer otherwise.
Just an FYI: The tire industry thinks any tire within 6 years of production can be sold as “new”.. The tire manufacturer I worked for tested 3 year old tires against freshly made and couldn’t find any performance difference. Tires in storage age fairly slowly because they are protected by waxes and antioxidants that flake off after the tires are first flexed. You can sometimes see this as a white film
The industry as a whole might, but at least the automotive side of B-F’stones do not, the distribution warehouses (tracked by barcode all the way to the store and then again at every inventory) are set up to not allow tires to be sent out to stores if over 3 years old, and at the company store level, they can not be sold once they hit 5 years old, I have had to drill 1" holes in the sidewalls of tires that were under 6 years old… The POS (point of sale) system when selling a tire (DOT numbers ARE required to be entered) will block the sale of a tire that is 5 years old…
The only walk around is to wholesale the tire(s) to venders where DOT entry is not required at the POS… But get caught by our auditor or upper management and it’s bye bye… Incorrect DOT entry if/when caught is a $5,000 fine per tire found that is paid at store level, I can assure, it won’t happen twice…
And company store also have a Very strict NO used sale of tires… Not even suppose to mount a used tire…
They may not do it now, but they use to. Michelin had tires listed on their website that were said they were only sold to discount warehouses like Walmart, Sams Club and BJs. Years ago I bought a set of Michelin X LT (only sold at places like Sams club, costco and BJs). They were identical to the Michelin LTX - but a little cheaper,
When I looked at my tire invoice this week I was surprised that it had the serial number listed separately for each tire. I’d never seen that before. Never knew they each had a bar code. Not sure who if anyone would maintain that information in case of a recall.
Some tire manufacturers maintain a data base.
That’s not how UTQG works. The treadwear rating is in comparison to a reference tire ( the specs of which the consumer doesn’t know) , the tire manufacturer is also allowed to understate the treadwear rating. That’s to say that if Michelin has a tire that they found has a treadwear rating of 400, they could list the treadwear number as say 300 if they wanted to. They couldn’t overstate it though. This makes direct comparisons between tire brands unclear, but usually it’s more reliable with comparing treadwear ratings within a given brand’s range.