Costco, how could you . . .

i hate to say it, but costco has finally let me down. i was afraid that their perfect track record with respect to myself was too good to be true - and apparently it was. i am seriously disappointed in the new development.

last week, i went to costco to get some new tires put on my pathfinder. currently, the tires becoming more bald and less safe with ever passing mile on my car are Michellin 255/65 R16's. a fine tire for the highway, and around town, but, as my brother so astutely pointed out the othe day, after my tailpipe became detatched from my auto, i should get better tires - ones that are meant to be used off of the road - because i'm allways taking my auto off of the road anyways, and breaking things off of it. well, his wisdom is sound, so i decided to get the BF Goodrich T/A KO tire. a tire specifically designed for autos like mine, to give a little more off road performance, while still being decent around town.

so, i went to costco, and they said that they could put the BF Goodrich tires on, if i ordered them on the internet. so, i went home, ordered the nearest size i could find - the 245/70 R16's. these tires would fit on my car. they are, however, a bit taller and a bit skinnier than my current tire. i couldnt order these tires for my Pathfinder 'SE', however, i could order them for the Pathfinder 'XE'. so i did. the rim is the same size, so, the tires would fit. and i think they would fit well. in an earlier conversation with a costco employee, it was discussed that i could put 255/70 R16's on my truck, no problem. there was even a michellin version of the same tire i currently have in that slightly taller size. i figured, a slightly skinnier tire would be fine as well, i mean, the only thing that really matters is the rim size.

so, my tires were ordered and one week later they arrived at costco. i was so excited to get new awesome tires! but it was not to be!

well, apparently costco is not allowed to put a tire on a car that is skinnier than the existing tire. and they have very specific sizing charts saying which tires they can and can not put onto a car. well. . . . according to costco today, the only tires the will even consider putting on my car are new Michellin's - the same as the ones that are currently on it. even though the new BFG tires would have fit. they claimed that the skinniness was the problem, so i asked if they could appropriately help me order 255/70 R16's, because BFG doesn't offer the T/A KO in a /65 model. then they confessed that they could only put on a tire that is the exact same size as the current tire. the only one being the road worth michellin

now, to Costco's credit, BF Goodrich does not say on their website that the tires i want are appropriate for my car. however - i am not the average user. and if the tire fits on the rim, i should be able to put it on my car, if i want to. so, now i have to find a place that will put the tires on my car. the service guy thought maybe SEARS could and would. the real disappointment here was that i had to waste a week and a half to find this out. now, i have a severly abbreviated time frame before i have to leave the country. who knows if i'll be able to get the tires i want . . .