When we bought our 04' in April 2012, the local tire distributor said "they look pretty good" (8200 miles total). But when I told him we were planning an Alaska Trip in May of 2013, He agreed that it was a very good idea to change them since they were 43rd week of 2003 manufacture. He said locally with a TPMS, he would run them until one or two went. But not when looking at an 11,000 mile trip with very few services for about a third of the trip. He gave us a good deal and said he would probably "resell those seven tires for use on farm equipment, which have normally a very short life". BTW the 7 B+ tires cost less than 2 of the tires on our Phaeton. I put Mastercraft LT tires by Cooper on the B+, since I usually got 80,000+ miles on them on my company cars without any problems. We now have 27,000 miles on the B+ without the 1st tire problem.