Are Hankooks bad tires? I bought a truck that came with them and they seemed to have been good tires. Good enough that I figured if I found the right deal, I'd buy them when the time came. Though I am fully aware, just because 1 model of tire by a manufacture is good, doesn't mean all their models are good. Kinda why I look at reviews.
So you're saying that Walmart does Tspec tires of sorts? For example, a TSpec tire being what GM, Ford or any other auto manufacture would have a tire manufacture build for the automaker to put on their new cars. Many are not aware there is a difference in a Tspec tire and a Retail tire. Usually where the automaker will have the tire manufacture make a cheaper version of their famous name branded tire, like a Good Year Wrangler AT, or Uniroyal Tiger Paw, Firestone Wilderness AT etc., but the Tspec tire is NOT the same quality of that same famous name brand/model tire if you were to go to a tire retailer and buy that same famous name brand/model.
The best TSpec vs Retail tire example I find is the Firestone Wilderness AT that Ford used on the Explorers that were flipping over and killing people that prompted an immediate recall. Ford blamed Firestone, Firestone blamed Ford. Firestone blamed Ford claiming they asked them to leave so many wraps out of the tire to make it cheaper. Ford blamed Firestone saying you made the tire, your engineers didn't tell us this would make for a dangerous tire and you're the tire expert. All the while they're fighting that out, the retail version of the Firestone Wilderness AT got a bad wrap too and it quit selling even though it was a perfectly safe and fully manufactured tire to Firestone engineered specs. As said above, I gladly bought a set of those RETAIL tires from a major tire retailers for about 60-70% off the retail price.
I don't doubt what you're saying about Walmart spec'ing their own tires for retail sales, but it would seem to me that the tire manufactures should want to give those Walmart retail spec'ed tires a derivative model # or name. That same exact model # and name I got is sold at Tire Rack and Amazon too that I'm aware of and not even sure where else. Hopefully they hold up well. If they don't, I'm still ahead IMO because they are sure to outlast and I know outperform the cheap ass Douglas tires that were just a few dollar cheaper. If the mileage, treadwear, load and speed ratings on the label mean anything then hopefully they'll work out OK. I know that set of Uniroyal Tiger Paws I bought from Walmart years ago were fantastic tires and even exceeded the 70,000 mile rating. Of course I know there are variables in those ratings too. Noway in hell I would have gotten 70,000 miles driving around town on those, but 85-90% of those miles were all highway.