[BlueElectrin]

If you are willing to trade performance for added safety, then don't get performance winters. They are better than all-seasons, but definitely not as good as "true winters" in term of stopping and cornering, especially on ice. Check out Tirerack for a pretty honest comparison between performance winters and true winters.

For true winters, Blizzaks WS-70, ExtremeWinterContact, and X-Ice2 are some of the top performing tires according Consumer Reports. Hakkapeliitta 5 seems like a good choice too, but the only place in town that sells them are Kal Tires, and I've experienced, and heard too many complains about Kal Tires to do any work with them.

In term of pricing, I did a comparison based on Blizzaks WS-70 between local shop (Harper's Tires), Tirerack, and Costco. While Tirerack has the lowest price, Costco will be the most "economical" because walk-out price includes tire change and Costco's own tire insurance. The price difference between Costco and Tirerack was less than 100 CDN dollars.

For bimmer owners looking to get a set of X-Ice2 from Costco, don't bother! As of Friday, Oct 28th, Costco has a back-order waiting period of 8 weeks for X-Ice2! This is for the 17" setup (225/45/17)

If you want to get Blizzaks WS-70 from Costco, you would need to place a special order, which translates to about a 7-10 days of waiting period, but on the plus side you get to book an appointment for tire swap, rather than facing the horrendous first-come-first-serve line.

Hope this helps.