The idea of this is great, the demo not so much.

Still, important information for anyone who commutes from one side of an ice rink to the other.

I've lived in Minnesota my whole life and have never bothered with snow tires. I guess I'm just not too keen on paying 1000 bucks or more on a set of tires I probably won't use for even half the year. Upvote because the trikes are kinda cool looking, but the commercial itself is nothing special.

I felt the same way until I noticed the big knobby tires I put on my truck all the time were snowflake branded. One cheap time of my life, I bought a set of all seasons for ridiculous cheap on a kijiji style local website and after driving around a bit in some cold -albeit rainy not snowy- weather, I sold them and went down and got a set of the snowflakes again.

You may not "bother" getting them, but getting them and relaxing while driving instead of letting your obvious driving skill get overused will be nice. Just go grab a set of used ones. See what it's like. You'll choose them next winter.

I thought most people living in your climate had a 'snow car' for winter....that being a cheap junker car they don't care about, done because the salt will destroy anything you drive in winter, and you won't care if you crash the junker at 5mph on ice. The story I saw about that said the snow tires are usually about 1/2 the total cost of the 'winter car'.
Is that wrong?

Had a very unsettling moment while watching this, as i mentally scolded this guy for not wearing a helmet... I suddenly realized in my head i was repeating 'lessons' from my parents... yikes.

For me, winter means you don't drive like you do during the rest of the year, it's how I learned to drive and so it's what I'm used to. I did buy cheap all season tires recently and I do have some regrets there, just not enough to stop using them. I don't consider myself to be all that great a driver, it's mostly just patience and paying attention.
@newtboy
I guess I'm not rich enough for a winter only car, but I drove a Dodge Neon for a dozen years or so and at the end it only had a little rust. While I have no doubt that winter is hell on cars, I suspect that sometimes the rust factor might be a bit exaggerated.

i wonder if it needs to be wet and slushy more and get really into all the joints and metalwork, rather than really cold and dry causing the salt to bounce around a lot ?

Nah, I'm in Victoria. We get, on average, a month more sun than Seattle. Hasn't been what even Sacramento would call a snow fall in a couple years. Average winter Temps are in the low to high 30s at worst nowadays.

Used to get a lot colder when I was a kid and going to school was the obligatory uphill both ways.

You know I'm not sure, we get plenty of both, with cold and dry for the main event and then wet and slushy when it's all over. ( but then if you're not wet and slushy when it's done then you're probably not doing it right. *badum-pssh*)

Here in Germany its easy to have a direct comparison. Winter tires are pretty much mandatory in the Winter. The difference is huge. You cant use summer tires or allseason ones on lots of snow. You will get stuck. With Winter tires you will have no problems except in the harshest conditions here only spikes or chains will help. But even there you will have it much easier with Winter tires than with summer ones.

Also, due to my high powered car, I easily notice when temperatures get too low for summer tires. They will start spinning much easier even on dry pavement. That starts at around 8C. Winter tires wont spin easily even at minus temperatures.

And yes, some people have season cars. One for Winter and one for warmer seasons. But thats mostly because they dont want to ruin the good season one, because its more valuable to them (mostly old timers, young timers, convertibles, sports cars).