It’s been quite some time since I first announced that Hi-Lo Trailers were coming back to life. This website was just a few weeks old and it was one of the first few posts I ever made. Three years and three months ago that post was written, and the only update I had was a year later, telling you that there were essentially no updates on the Hi-Lo.
While I’ve made efforts to get some facts from Hi-Lo boss and Pennsylvania RV dealer Bill Kerola, those requests have gone unanswered. However, thanks to the Kerola Camper Store Facebook page, the first images of a Hi-Lo prototype were released.
Even though I’ve not received a response from Bill Kerola, I still felt it necessary to post these pics from their Facebook page since I get e-mails periodically inquiring about the future of the Hi-Lo, and because Hi-Lo had a long run in the RV industry before shuttering their doors in 2010.
What I do know is that Bill Kerola is the gent on the right in the photo. Now, the following is nothing more than speculation on my part. But hey, speculation is fun and makes you look brilliant if reality turns out that way. Here are a few facts I’ve put together:
1. In a December 6, 2014 post on their Facebook page, Kerola Campers wrote: “We have some new projects in the works for Kerola’s Campers. Here is the frame for our next venture heading out. More pictures next week!”
This tells me it was heading somewhere outside of their Trasnfer, Pennsylvania location.
2. If you’ll notice in this next photo, there is a Hi-Lo pictured behind the chassis of the prototype. Since we know there are no “new” Hi-Los, that one in the background has to be a 2010 or older.
3. With that in mind, we also know that Kerola Campers sells a travel trailer called the “Midget”. We don’t know a lot about the Midget other than they are built in Ohio, AND the plant also doubles as a Hi-Lo repair facility. I quote from the Midget website:
“I (Joel) am the former Plant Manager of the HiLo Company and have been around HiLo for the past 30 years. That’s because my father-in-law is Jim Snyder former owner of the company. It was his brother Don Snyder who started HiLo back in 1955.
2011 was a big year for our new repair and manufacturing shop. We hired Tim a former employee of HiLo to assist in the repairs of HiLo’s and building new trailers in our Midget line.”
So now we see that Kerola Campers has a relationship with a trailer manufacturer who also spent time building Hi-Los and now repairing them. With the fact they build the Midget, this tells me they have the ability to build other trailers….perhaps even a new Hi-Lo.
So when I connect all these dots, it appears to me that these former Hi-Lo employees that build trailers (The Midget) also are the ones building the new Hi-Lo. Again, just speculation, but I’d be more surprised if these aren’t the facts. Hopefully I can get a reply from Bill Kerola so he can just tell me what I think I already know.