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Over the past 10 months, visitors to our Hawaiʻi and American Samoa national park stores have been incredibly generous. At checkout, they have consistently chosen to add a donation to their purchases, and those small gifts have added up to an extraordinary $356,000.

That is a powerful number. But more importantly, it is a powerful demonstration of how much people care about their national parks.

Every dollar donated at a park store stays in the park where it was given, helping support native wildlife, Hawaiian cultural programs, local visiting students, youth ranger programs, and other important work. Behind every dollar donated is a person who made a simple choice from a big heart.

Over the course of the year, some months brought an especially strong outpouring of generosity; other months were quieter. But month after month, visitors continued to step up at the register. That is the real power of giving as a community: many small acts of generosity become a meaningful investment in our national parks.

That $356,000 represents people who value the opportunity to stand at the edge of a volcanic landscape, walk along a quiet beach, or make their way through a native forest listening for the calls of endemic birds. It represents people who want to learn more about Hawaiian history and culture, people who understand the feeling that comes from standing in a special place and knowing that, for one moment, you are part of history ... and part of the future, too.

It also represents a belief that these national park sites and the experiences they offer should be vibrant and protected for generations to come, and it demonstrates a commitment to the people who care for these places every day and help make those experiences possible.

At Hawaiʻi Pacific Parks Association, we are deeply grateful to every visitor who has chosen to make a donation at checkout. Whether it was a simple round-up, a dollar, five dollars, or more, you helped make this remarkable total possible and that makes so much possible in the parks we all love to support.

Thank you for being part of this success story. To learn more about our work, click the Our Work tab in the menu bar.

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Want to donate directly?

You can shop to support national parks.

Have you ever wondered about the experience of working for an association like HPPA, which partners with national parks to support programs and projects? Enjoy this insightful guest blog by HPPA’s Wendy Hatch, a member of our frontline sales and interpretive team at Haleakalā National Park with a unique perspective.

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I’ve had a long and evolving connection with the Hawaiʻi Pacific Parks Association (HPPA). After moving to Maui in 2000, I volunteered at Haleakalā National Park for a few months before accepting a frontline sales and interpretive position with HPPA in the visitor center park stores. I loved recommending my favorites from our excellent selection of books. Then, I moved to Germany in 2003, where I volunteered for a nature organization, and then to San Francisco, CA, where I worked for another partner association, the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy. 
 
I moved back to Maui, and my second stint with HPPA was from 2013 to 2017, after being a seasonal ranger at Haleakalā National Park for two years. I was so happy to continue working at the national park I loved, but eventually I decided to try my hand at tour guiding and became a tour guide, birding guide, and manager for a company which leads tours in the park, my favorite place! 
 
As a tour guide, I spent whole days with my guests and got new perspectives on the visitor experience, on what people are looking for when they visit the national park. I think all of us as travelers feel more receptive and pay more attention when we are in an unfamiliar area. I loved seeing the connections visitors made when they were immersed in the park landscape, observing birds, tasting berries, and hiking at high elevation. I could share Hawaiian legends and chants with their underlying cultural meanings, and explain why what they're noticing is often found only here within park borders. This guiding job cemented, for me, the realization of how important national parks are, in Hawaiʻi and across the country. For example, when Haleakalā National Park was closed, it was nearly impossible to find another place to see native Hawaiian forest birds on Maui.
 
Eventually I felt ready for a change, and HPPA was hiring. It was time to come back.
 
I am super appreciative of the nonprofit I returned to this year. I like the camaraderie of working with a team of people who care about the national parks as much as I do, the supportive managerial staff, the generous HPPA benefits, and the high-quality products that we offer, like handmade mugs and unique collectibles. We have such great products that celebrate our island geology and native Hawaiian species (plant, insect, and animal). It's easy to talk to visitors about how they can experience what they're interested in, and the significance of it, even in a short interaction—and in more depth if we're not too busy! A change I have noticed is that fewer people are buying physical books and more people are looking for great social media photos, so our merchandising has adapted to focus less on books and more on individualized apparel that promotes the park and its unique natural and cultural features. 
 
Because HPPA staff is in the national park on a daily basis and often communicating with National Park Service staff, we can share current stories and photos. For example, we can talk about the three adult nēnē geese and three goslings currently joined in an unusual family group that have chosen to live near the busy Headquarters Visitor Center and park store. We know that one of the ganders lost his mate because she got hit by a car in the park, and that he followed the other pair and goslings around at a distance until he got accepted into the family group. People can connect with the individual geese in this story, and understand how national parks protect endangered species habitat, as well as their responsibility as visitors to drive carefully on park roads.
 
On the frontline in the visitor center park stores, I provide a welcoming presence and a point of connection to the national park by paying close attention to each visitor that approaches me. Thanks to all of my diverse experiences, I realize how important that is. HPPA staff can make a difference even with a short conversation during checkout. I can connect with a visitor’s love of the park and their wish to have a tangible reminder of their experience, and feel blessed by their willingness to make donations on top of their purchases or share the amazing discoveries they made. I am advocating for this beautiful national park, which people journey to see, and am so grateful to have the chance to join this amazing team again! 
 
Third time is the charm.

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Learn about Haleakalā National Park.

Shop Haleakalā National Park's Summit District.

Shop Haleakalā National Park's Kīpahulu District.

Book those important sunrise reservations here.

Have you joined our Haleakalā Silversword Watch on social media?

Keith, on our Haleakalā National Park visitor center park stores team there on Maui, chooses one Haleakalā silversword plant a summer near the dry, cindery summit of the volcano to document weekly as it finally decides to send up a massive flower stalk, unfurl it, bloom like crazy, and then die back with its one mission completed: spread those tiny seeds on the wind to ensure the next generation.

What, though, IS a Haleakalā silversword plant?

Read more: The Miracle of the Haleakalā Silversword: Resilient, Fragrant, and Singular.

Yvonne Baur is a former member of Team HPPA at our Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park store locations. She left HPPA to study volcanoes as a full time university student and volcano tour guide. She is also a a committed hiker in the park, and shared this post with us from one of her incredible long hikes in the backcountry. If this sounds intriguing to you, some tips and rules are included here.

Hilina = struck (as by wind)
Pali = cliff
Hilina Pali = "windy cliff"

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The coastal backcountry of Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park is a special place: hot, windy, and no shade. The few trees in this hostile area are mostly dead, the bleached-out branches standing like skeletal sentinels braving the winds. Shade is sparse to non-existent, and the whipping wind can be so strong that it literally makes you lose your balance. It is dry out there. Very dry, desert dry. Enough water is absolutely essential.

Read more: Down the Pali, Along the Shore, A Guest Blog by Yvonne Baur

Your purchases from our visitor center national park stores and online site support programs and projects at our national parks partners. When Kiry Galapir stepped into the brand-new role of E-commerce Specialist for HPPA a few years ago, she began with fulfilling incoming online order requests from our new national parks commerce site. While nearly all of the orders for natural history and Hawaiian history books, national parks apparel, fun park gifts and hiking essentials were from individuals, school orders gradually became part of that workflow. What started as standard customer service has now evolved into something much more meaningful: supporting educators across Hawaiʻi with hands-on learning tools.

Recently, we received an inquiry from Kamehameha Preschools from an administrative coordinator who wanted purchase a large set of educational plush items for their classrooms to be used as interpretive teaching tools.
The request was significant.
100 each of the following:
Makana the Nēne Plush, Makamae the Plush Gosling, Naʻauau the Plush Pueo, Kahoʻokele the Plush Petrel, Hawaiian Happyface Spider Plush, Kamehameha Butterfly Plush, Hawaiʻi State Marine Life, Marine Native Species, and Hawaiʻi Native Species finger puppets—all custom created for our park partners. We also carry honu (sea turtle), and heʻe (octopus) plush.
In total, 1,100 plush were destined for 89 classrooms across the Hawaiian Islands.

Read more: Supporting National Parks In A New Way: Bringing Native Species Plush to Keiki Across Hawaiʻi

When Leanne first interviewed for a frontline position with HPPA at our Puʻukoholā Heiau National Historic Site store on the Kohala Coast of Hawaiʻi Island, she remembers being in survival mode. “I was surviving, not thriving, in my life then,” she says. Long days at her retail department store job, unpredictable shifts, and constant exhaustion had become her “normal”. Her niece Rebecca, a ranger at Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park on the southeast side of the island, came to visit during a lunch break. As they talked, Rebecca said plainly, “Auntie, this job is killing you.” Then she mentioned that HPPA at Puʻukoholā Heiau National Historic Site was hiring for the visitor center store.

Read more: Leanne: Coming Full Circle at Puʻukoholā

Looking for a fresh way to move your body and recharge your mind? Step outside. The national parks of Hawaiʻi and American Samoa offer some of the most inspiring “workout spaces” on Earth. Whether you’re easing into a new routine or pushing your limits, there’s a trail, shoreline, or scenic stretch that meets you where you are.

We thought about some ways to get outside and move, in whatever way works for you. Fresh air, new places to discover, birds and wildlife, sweeping views, and varied terrain make every national park outing a win for your physical, mental, and emotional well-being. Here are eight options for easy, moderate, and more strenuous adventures. Bring a hat, sun shirt, full water bottle, snacks, a fully charged phone, and your enthusiasm!

Read more: National Parks As Your Personal Gym:  Health-Boosting Outings in Hawaiʻi and American Samoa

Hi! Iʻm Chuck Danilowski, and I am the Custom Project Management Specialist for Hawaiʻi Pacific Parks Association (HPPA). I ensure that any custom-made products that you purchase in our national park visitor center stores or online shop move efficiently through the Creative Services Department from initial design concept to final finished product on park store shelves. Our national park partners, and the stores we run within them, are located in Hawaiʻi and American Samoa.
 
I recently attended the Public Lands Alliance (PLA) Annual Convention & Trade Show in Daytona Beach, Florida. The Public Lands Alliance is a national organization dedicated to the protection and enjoyment of America’s public lands through its mission to connect, strengthen, and represent the nonprofit organizations that support these treasured places. HPPA is a member of PLA.
 
It was my first time attending this amazing gathering of like-minded professionals. There were informative and eye-opening educational sessions, a two-day trade show with vendors from across the U.S., a silent auction, and the chance to network with people I had only known through emails or phone calls. It was a time to put faces with names, and to browse product offerings that we may bring into our visitor center park stores to teach, inform, and connect to a lasting memory in someone’s mind of their national park experience. 
 

Read more: Connecting People to Parks: Stories, Stewardship, and Inspiration from the Public Lands Alliance...

It’s easy to think they’ve always been here. You walk into a visitor center in a national park and there’s the store. Shelves of books you won’t find anywhere else. Locally made art. Field guides. A child picking out her first patch, plush, or postcard. It feels like part of the park itself. But these stores didn’t just appear. They grew out of a mission to help people connect more deeply to the places they were visiting.

Back in 1916, the National Park Service was established to care for a small but growing group of parks, including Hawaiʻi National Park which, at that time, included both Maui and Hawaiʻi Island acreage. As more people began visiting these new public lands across the nation, they wanted more than just a quick look. They wanted to understand what they were seeing—the wild landscapes, the history of the people there, the stories of the past and ideas about the future. National park staff were overwhelmed by the tides of visitors exploring "America's Best Idea", and couldn’t manage it all alone. In 1920, the Yosemite Museum Association was founded and stepped in to help. They began offering books and educational materials to visitors, creating a new kind of partnership, one that focused on education, connection, and support.

Read more: Carrying the Story Home: From Books to Belonging, How National Park Stores Came to Be

If you plan to visit the National Park of American Samoa, you may meet HPPA's Melekuini in the fascinating visitor center and park store. This U.S. national park in the South Pacific is remote, but it is visited by cruise ships all year long, as well as dedicated independent travelers. HPPA loves to tell the story of this incredible place, our partner, through the products we sell and the park programs and projects we help fund with those proceeds. You may pick up a fun fruit bat shirt or a coconut crab puzzle kit, and while you're there, you may meet this remarkable person. Here is her story.

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I started working for the Hawaiʻi Pacific Parks Association at the National Park of American Samoa on September 19, 2025. Before that, my journey in the park first began when I became a KUPU conservation intern with the National Park Service. At first I worked in trail maintenance, caring for our native plants and spending long days out in the forest. That experience really deepened my love and respect for the land. Later, I transitioned into park interpretation, where I was able to connect with visitors and share what makes this place so special. I later interned with the American Conservation Experience, where I gained even more skills and helped lead the dendrology program. During my term, I earned certifications in Oxygen Use, Emergency First Response, CMS, and FEMA. Those opportunities strengthened both my skills and my confidence. Altogether, these experiences helped me realize that I wanted to continue working in a national park, protecting the environment while sharing knowledge and Samoan culture with others.

Read more: Meet Melekuini: Rooted in Culture at the National Park of American Samoa