Bobby Zangrilli '05 knew what a hard guy was before he ever set foot on the Dartmouth campus.
"The only time I ever saw my dad cry was when [Michael] Jordan retired," he said. "My brother and I started laughing, and then my dad said, 'I'm only crying because he made so much money for me, from betting on the Bulls.' It was a Soft Dude moment, but he spun it like a veteran Hard Guy."
Zangrilli and his friend Dave Grey '05 started Hard Guy Tees last year to capture sentiments like this one in T-shirt form.
According to the company's newly launched website, the shirts are designed to appeal to "the alpha male and his girlfriend."
The shirts feature an Abercrombie and Fitch-style vintage elephant -- "think phallic," the website suggests -- along with the slogan "throwing down since 1898," a reference to the year Teddy Roosevelt and the Rough Riders charged San Juan Hill.
Each shirt prominently features various aspects of the hard guy lifestyle -- from sports to romance -- emblazoned on the front. Messages include "Hard Guy Golf: One beer a hole, loser drives home" and "Hard Guy Dating: Having a girlfriend and not even liking her."
The company's website, which spotlights Grey one morning as he pours Jack Daniels over a bowl of cornflakes, is a key to the company's success. Though the site, run by Grey, Zangrilli, and Mike Reiss '06, has yet to be formally advertised, Zangrilli said sales are already strong, with the majority of business coming from locations outside Hanover.
The site also displays a series of hard guy stories and advice. According to Zangrilli, the off-color humor has elicited a steady stream of hate mail.
"The latest was from an '08, and the gist of the e-mail was, 'I can't believe you have an Ivy League degree,'" Zangrilli said.
When approached by The Dartmouth, some female students on campus also said they found the features on the company's website disrespectful.
"I can see how it could be very offensive to girls," Joanna Brooks '09 said. "But you take everything with a grain of salt."
Despite their critics, Hard Guy Tees retains a strong presence on campus, with Grey and Zangrilli keeping in contact with the members of Phi Delta Alpha and Theta Delta Chi fraternities, as well as various senior friends, to create publicity and brainstorm ideas for new t-shirts.
"I would consider myself a consultant," Joe Boswell '06 said. "I'm one of the soldiers they have on the ground putting the hard guy culture out on the street."
Zangrilli, however, said his hard guy status may be up for debate. Although he slept on fraternity couches during his senior year so he could save money to start the company, he also made a silver bracelet for his freshman-year girlfriend at the Hopkins Center jewelry shop.
Boswell also said he sees shades of grey when it comes to defining firmness.
"In every true hard guy, there is a soft dude side lingering down somewhere deep," Boswell said. "It's a fine balance."
