The last few years have been incredibly stupid. And for a lot of folks, they were hard. But the worst part about this is the rampant price gouging implemented by everyone, from the donut shop on the corner to the too-big-to-fail airlines. Forget the prices of 2019; the pandemic may be out of the headlines, but high prices are here to stay.
And you know what else? Tires are just too goddamn expensive. And this burns my ass because tires are one of the most rapidly depreciating features on a car or truck that unfortunately do have a very real shelf life and also are incredibly important to both the safe operation of a motor vehicle and your enjoyment of it. Great tires can transform a mediocre driver into an entertaining commuter far quicker than throwing $1000s at suspension improvements. In effect, you have to pay the piper with tires if you're a car enthusiast, and I'm guessing the manufacturers know this. They jacked the prices during COVID and they ain't never coming back.
Recently, it became obvious that among the 1,002 things wrong with the Dakota R/T, it also had four mismatched tires that were all bald. This fucking thing - I mean, there is nothing these bozos before me didn't cheap the hell out on. My priority was to find four, matching performance tires that were 275s to give the super wide OEM alloy wheels some much-needed meat. Except, these days, four of those tires cost $730. Seven hundred and thirty bucks! For something that is worth half that after you drive four feet.
Because my logic knows no bounds, I found a set of lightly-used (summer only) General Grabbers in the desired 275/55/17 size on craigslist in a convenient location 90 miles west of Minneapolis (I live in Rhode Island). I called my friend Scott and paid him $68 for gas and packing materials to drive out there, pay the guy $330 for his used for three months tires, and then I generated two labels @ $89 each to ship them eastward. So, $576 all in. I saved $150. It's not a lot, I get it, and I put poor Scott out on a Sunday morning wherein he likely had 382 other things he'd rather be doing.
But screw these guys and their inflated pricing when supply chains are freed up and half the nation still isn't driving anywhere. Tires aren't coming back down ever again, and no one will bat an eye.