Very Little Heat???

OK here's the scoop, I'm a noob here and frequent many other forums but this is my first here... I have an 02 SL1 SOHC and seems this year (winter) I have had problems with my heater temp. Temp guage is on them low side of 1/3 but I really just get enough heat to defrost the windshield when I let it warm up... The coolant level is good, I added less than a pint a month or so ago and it seemed to help, but today semmed even worse... I have almost 130,000 miles on the old girl, so my next obvious conclusion was a thermostat... $32 at the local auto parts store??? What's up with that, is the thing filled with platinum or what??? I just hate to start parts at it at 30 bucks a pop if that's not gonna cure the issue... Anybody else had these issues???
Also I hit a racoon a few months back and damaged (destroyed) the plastic cover under the front air dam, could this be part of my issue???

Thanks in advance,
Rags

Get a dealer thermostat only ~20 bucks. Aftermarket ones sometimes fail.

It's probably that expensive because it comes with the housing. You can buy them without the housing and they come with a stiff cardboard tube to remove and re-install into your housing. I don't share rc1488's assertion that dealer parts are the only way to go. Most of the time, the parts that are original in your car are the same parts that are sold in auto parts stores under various brand names.