Kind of irrelevant since you decided to stick with OEM, but for what it's worth...
I wouldn't let the fact that ANY brand distributes/sells through Wal-Mart scare you away from them. Pioneer sells some of their lower end stuff at Wal-Mart and I run head units from them that had MSRPs of over $1000 when they were new. Just because a brand caters to the low end as well doesn't mean their nice stuff is garbage.
I've been a Kicker fan for quite a while, for different reasons over the years. I used to run two Solo-Baric L7 12's in an old Maxima, that started my whole car audio addiction. They're not the cleanest sounding subs out there, but those square SBs will pound in a sealed box. Later on I became a lot more interested in sound quality as opposed to volume, and discovered that Kicker had some great entry-mid level interior speakers. I run some really nice DLS Reference series speakers in my red truck and I feel like the Kicker KS series in the Suburban give them a run for their money, especially considering the difference in price points. Like anyone else, the cheaper stuff they make isn't the greatest. But Kicker's KS series and up are pretty damn decent. Same with their subs, the Comps are meh but the Solo Barics are LOUD.
