The Hot Chocolate Run for Safe Passage Warms Survivors to Community
By Melissa Karen Sances
Published in Northampton Living | December 2025
Sponsored By Greenfield Savings Bank
As the 22nd annual Hot Chocolate Run for Safe Passage approaches the starting line, the nonprofit’s executive director, Marianne Winters, reflects on the race’s considerable reach. What started as a 400-person run now draws six thousand runners, walkers, volunteers and spectators to support survivors of domestic violence. The organization’s biggest fundraiser allows it to finance initiatives like prevention services, which aim to educate future generations to create lasting change.
Winters, who has spent 40 years in the field – the last 15 with Safe Passage – stresses that domestic violence is extremely isolating for survivors of all genders. Yet this lonely experience is hardly uncommon. The National Network to End Domestic Violence reported in 2020 that 13 calls per minute are made to local domestic violence hotlines. Winters says that calls to Safe Passage have increased by 5 percent in the last year.
Here for Us
On December 7, the Northampton community will show survivors that they are not alone. Winters remembers one particular Hot Chocolate Run when, as runners breezed by her and a client, the client looked at her and said, “I think these people are here for me. These people are here for me, aren’t they?” The client didn’t know any of the runners’ names, and they would never know hers, but for Winters it was a defining moment of connection.
“The Hot Chocolate Run has really enabled us to ask survivors what they need versus saying, ‘This is what we can offer you,’” says Director of Development Natalie Ulrich. Still, she stresses that getting help is a multistep, even multiyear process. “I think there is this almost romanticized notion that domestic violence looks like a woman fleeing in the night. But it takes years of services to get from one place to the next, from where they are to safety.”
Fun Run
While what brings people to Safe Passage is grave, the Hot Chocolate Run is pure bliss, says Ulrich. It’s actually three events in one: a 3K walk, a 5K fun run and a 5K road race. The top three teams, individuals and individual youth fundraisers are recognized, and this year the nonprofit will honor the “rookie of the year.”
As for the hot chocolate, staff at the Western Massachusetts Food Processing Center will awaken at 3 a.m., steal away to the kitchen like elves, and prepare a recipe that starts with 400 gallons of milk. (A nondairy version will also be available.) By 12 p.m., thousands will warm up with cocoa made from scratch at the finish line.
For parents who want to bring their kids, a heated baby care tent, stocked with rocking chairs, will be on-site. “There are parents whose kids came as babies and are now in college and are still coming and running,” says Ulrich. “It’s just become this family tradition, so it really adds to that essence of joy.”
To sign up for the Hot Chocolate Run, visit hotchocolaterun.com. For more on Safe Passage, visit safepass.org. The nonprofit is currently running a critical support fund – to contribute, reach out to Natalie Ulrich at 413-586-1125 ext. 19 or natalie@safepass.org.
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