3 days ago
"Hug Your Homies": The Story Behind a Little Sticker With a Big Goal
'Hug your homies and tell them you love them.'It's a straightforward suggestion. You may have seen it in the form of green, rectangular stickers on ski helmets or elsewhere, particularly if your home mountain is Alta Ski Area, Utah. The phrase and sticker was popularized by Dan Parisi, 29, who moved to Salt Lake City about five years ago, fell in love with the skiing, and stayed put. He was inspired to honor a member of the Alta community who died by suicide in December 2023. The stickers served as what Parisi called 'a subtle reminder to check in on your friends' and 'hold your loved ones tight.'The stickers proved popular. Parisi handed them out that winter, and when he ran dry, people began asking where they could get more. Then, as the season wound down, one of his friends suggested during a chairlift ride that he take the stickers' concept further and start creating apparel. Parisi, who's faced his own challenges with mental health, took the idea seriously—and started shaping it into what would become Hug Your to keep up with the best stories and photos in skiing? Subscribe to the new Powder To The People newsletter for weekly updates.
Hug Your Homies is now more than just a sticker—it's a fledgling brand with a varied lineup of apparel that donates a portion of its proceeds to two organizations Parisi views highly, one local and one national: Alta Community Enrichment (ACE) and the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP).Hug Your Homies arrives at a time when skiers—and the mountain community at large—seem more open to conversations about mental health than ever. Skier and advocate John Padilla has now created three films under the Mountain in My Mind banner, each espousing a mix of gnarly shredding and frank conversations about suicide, depression, and anxiety. Professional skier Drew Petersen's short documentary, Ups and Downs, which followed his battle with PTSD, bipolar disorder, and a traumatic brain injury, released online to wide acclaim in 2022.
Hug Your Homies, then, fits into a wider ski culture shift, but it has its own quirky flavor. One of the brand's shirts reads 'Kiss your homies with your eyes open' and, on Parisi's website, is accompanied by a brief description that includes the sentence, 'You give each other a quick lil smooch because they're your dawg.' To an older audience, that line might seem bizarre. But for a younger generation raised at the intersection of irony and sincerity, it's both funny and heartfelt. Parisi, through his less over-the-top stickers, aimed to create something that felt natural, mining a vein that already existed in the ski community: mutual adoration of the people we spend time in the mountains with. He said he chose the catchphrase 'hug your homies' because it's 'something that you can hear a skier saying.''I feel like it's such a strong message that can be applied to so many things, which is what I love,' Parisi wants Hug Your Homies to do more than create conversations about mental health and make merch. One day, he hopes that the brand will have its own gathering space and community hub, but activities like group hikes and mini ramp sessions, which provide an alternative to the partying popular in mountain towns, are more tangible.
He's already gotten started. In early June, Parisi hosted a small rail jam at the base of Alta Ski Area with the help of his friends, setting up a series of PVC tubes so people could hang out and work on their tricks. And, this summer, he has numerous pop-ups planned at Park Silly, an open-air market in Park City, Utah.
Beyond that, Parisi is still figuring out the details of what might come next, and admits, with a laugh, that 'I'm not the best event planner.' In the meantime, though, his goals, like his stickers, aren't too complicated.'I try to just be a friendly face in the community,' he said. 'I try to brighten people's days as much as I can.'
"Hug Your Homies": The Story Behind a Little Sticker With a Big Goal first appeared on Powder on Jun 10, 2025
