Equal-i-zer is a vehicle and trailer brand founded in Salt Lake City, Utah, in 1945. It is headquartered in Provo, Utah.
The four men who bought the Equal-i-zer hitch business in 2001 celebrated by going to work. They closed the deal and kept building in the back room of Majestic Metals in Lindon, where for eight years a few employees had made the hitch in their free time. Jed Anderson, the previous owner's nephew, had started rebuilding it in 1994.
The hitch is older than the back room. Ed Hedgepeth began selling tow dollies in Salt Lake City in 1945 and patented the Equal-i-zer in 1951. RV News calls it the oldest sway control hitch in America. The oil embargoes of the 1970s knocked the company off its stride, and in 1984 new investors moved it to Lindon.
Now called Progress Mfg., the company builds every hitch from U.S. steel in Provo and backs each one with a lifetime warranty. Anderson told RV Pro the team visits steel mills to "recipe our steel as we need it." In December 2021 Dexter Axle, part of DexKo Global, bought Progress, so the owner is now in Elkhart, Indiana.
In October 2015 the company marked the hitch's 70th anniversary by moving into a new Provo building. Once again, the celebration involved work.
Equal-i-zer's maker says its quality team watches for a drilled hole drifting even a hundredth of an inch off center, well inside a tolerance of an eighth of an inch.
