Hills has continued to expand its’ Hills Hoist offering and also manufactures clotheslines, laundry drying accessories, ironing boards, and garden watering tools such as water hoses and sprayers.
Hills started in 1945, when Lancelot (Lance) Leonard Hill returned home from the Second World War. He found his wife Sherry struggling to hang the washing between the overgrown trees in their back yard, so he took some old pipe, a welder and an innovative idea and created what was to become a world famous Australian icon and the Hills Hoist was born.
Word of Lance’s invention quickly spread. One day, while traveling on a tram to work, Lance overheard two women talking about wanting a rotary clothes hoist they had seen in a friend’s yard. Lance got off the tram at the next stop, walked home and told Sherry that he was going into business to make the Hoist and the rest is history.
In 2017 Hills became part of the Ames family of brands. Hills products are sold primarily in Australia and New Zealand but also distributed throughout the world.