The confluence between death care, estate settlement, and planning for both

June 17, 2026/Business, Products/

When you think about it, the death of a loved one sets in motion a chain of events that, in many instances and dependent on family economics, cannot be stopped. There is the death, the disposition and/or services, and the wrapping up of the estate, or as commonly called, the estate settlement process.

For decades a funeral home handled the disposition and services and a lawyer, legal team, and sometimes a financial manager or accountant helped families gather the assets and wrap up the estate process.

However, as this article in the Times of London alludes to, there are now companies that are setting their sights on doing all of those processes. One of those companies is Octopus Legacy and you can find their website here. While they don’t dabble in funeral services yet, Octopus Energy, Great Britain’s #1 electricty and gas supplier, has backed Octopus Legacy and has seen it grow to be the “second-biggest player” in estate management.

Simon Rogerson, Octopus Energy’s CEO says this about the greater death industry, “[Energy] is the number one societal problem, The number one human problem is the death of a loved one. That is the most emotional thing that’s ever going to happen to you in your life.”

Another company seemingly working on melding Death and Estate issues into one confluent stream is Dignity. Dignity is the former public Death Care firm that was taken private a couple of years ago by Sir Peter Wood, founder of the Direct Line and Esure insurance companies. At this time Dignity operates nearly 600 funeral branches and 46 crematoriums in Great Britain according to the linked Times of London article. The company has already acquired the will and estate planning company Farewill in 2024.

You can access Farewill’s website here and see that it offers “Wills, probate, and funerals” all from one website.

Dignity is being operated by Zillah Byng-Thorne at this time. She makes this comment in the article, ”

“Going through probate is a horrible process. It is something of a cottage industry predominantly run by old high street lawyers and has been left as one of the last industries not to be modernised. Did you know that half of the UK population doesn’t have a will? It’s unbelievable. End-of-life planning has always been a bit of a taboo subject, especially in the UK. Even if you don’t want to buy a funeral plan, let’s discuss your preferences and plan everything ahead of time.”

Byng-Thorne suggests in the article that prospective clients need a more “customer-centric” approach to all of this planning. The article also states that Octopus Legacy is “similarly trying to drag end-of-life services into the digital age”.

Tom Anderson
Funeral Director Daily

Funeral Director Daily take: We have not seen a lot of this “line extension” in the United States. . . yet. However, the idea of customer or client acquisition through one product (such as Death Care) and leading them into another service they will need (like estate settlement) offered by the same company is nothing new.

I’m guessing that this type of line extension, possibly including Preneed, Death Care, and Estate Settlement, is not too far off in the United States. . . .One question might be “Who will lead it — funeral home firms, financial/legal firms, or insurance companies?”.

More news from the world of Death Care: