warehouse, a performance shop, and executive offices.  We also operate through our website, www.highlifter.com, which is visited by almost 200,000 unique visitors per month, and includes a full product catalog, a chat room and forum, games, an online ATV magazine, and many, many more informative and entertaining features.

How it Began – The Lift Kit

Scott’s father, current High Lifter General Manager Mike Smith, was the mastermind behind High Lifter’s first product – the lift kit.  Mike had seen homemade lifts for ATVs, and wanted one.  Because Scott was more “construction minded” (he was already co-owner of a local construction company), Mike asked him to make one for his 1996 Honda 400 Foreman so he could run larger tires and achieve more ground clearance.  Scott and Mike soon realized that this was both a great and badly needed product, but also realized that it could never be sold and marketed in its current configuration as a weld-on accessory.  Over the next few months, work began on developing the bolt-on lift kit.  In the early days, there was plenty of outside help to get this project going.  “We designed dozens of bolt-on kits before arriving at the finished product, a front lift for a Honda 400,” says Mike.

Since Mike had a full time job working for Caddo Parish, he realized that his “real” job did not allow the flexibility to pursue completing the lift and then marketing it.  Rather than see this much needed accessory go by the way side, Scott and Mike both decided that Scott would take over and make the High Lifter lift kit a reality.

Once the front lift for the Honda 400 was completed, Scott began to run test ads in the local Thrifty Nickel.  This generated enough interest in the lift that more ads were run in Thrifty Nickels in 10 other southern cities.  Within a few months, High Lifter was spending more on Thrifty Nickel ads than the first Dirt Wheels ad cost and was not getting near as much exposure.

Scott knew he needed a “shop” to work out of.  He borrowed some money to buy some basic equipment and built a small workshop behind his house.  Scott spent his nights after work building and selling the kits.  “All inventory was kept in a small plastic dish-sized tub,” jokes Scott.  The next order of business would be a name.  Again, Mike came through.  “The name High Lifter was selected as being reasonably indicative of what the product is – a lift that makes ATVs higher,” says Mike.