Recently Apple was named the sponsor of this year’s Super Bowl halftime show. They will be replacing Pepsi, who has been the sponsor for several years. It occurred to me, and it was not surprising, that this is the business of new “information technology” replacing the old standardized American “product innovation, manufacturing, distribution” business of days gone by. Here is a short article about the change. It wasn’t the only “change” I noticed recently. Just on Friday, we printed a […]
I have a son that works in the automotive industry and we’ve discussed their lines of revenue quite often. For instance the average dealership has about six primary lines of revenue – new car sales, used car sales, the service or repair center, a collision repair center, a leasing center, and a financing center. At any given time some of those lines may be bringing in revenue. . sometimes dependent on the economy and supply chain. In the funeral home […]
Last week the Valkyrie Trading Society wrote an article for Seeking Alpha entitled “Service Corporation International: Feeling minimal pressures”. You can access the article here. Here are three take-aways from that article: The themes are that COVID-19 pulled forward mortality, making 2020 and 2021 strong years for Service Corporation International. There is also commentary around reduced discretionary spending, which is affecting the very cash and margin generative pre-need business and merchandise and services. Nonetheless, the pressures are quite small and […]
Earlier this week California Governor Gavin Newsom quietly signed a bill that now becomes law which includes disposition of the dead human body via “human composting”. According to this article from KABC Television of Los Angeles supporters say it’s an environmentally-friendly alternative to traditional end-of-life options. The law does not go into effect until 2027. At this time, however, it marks California as the 5th state that has allowed Natural Organic Reduction (NOR) as a legal way of human disposition. […]
Wilbert Funeral Services, Inc., (WFSI) the leading provider of burial vaults and cremation-related products and services in North America, is pleased to announce the launch of their new Cremation Choices Catalog on October 1st. Wilbert Merchandising Manager, Mike Devaney stated, “We are excited about the new expanded catalog. We are adding 80 new urns and mementos to our line of over 300 cremation products. Our goal is to give our licensee network and the funeral home customers they serve the […]
Back when I was in mortuary school I read a book entitled something like “Who takes care of the Caretaker“. While there are other books with titles similar to that published later than the 1970’s I cannot locate the book I read, nor do I remember the author of it. Quite frankly, that’s not real important. I also don’t remember any of the content of the book and that’s not real important either. What I do remember is the name […]
We learned late last week in this press release that Funeral Directors Life Insurance Company (FDLIC) of Abilene, Texas, acquired the American Life and Annuity Company (ALAC) of Hot Springs, Arkansas. According to the press release “effective immediately, FDLIC will work to support existing ALAC policyholders and Arkansas funeral homes”. Again, according to the press release, “President and CEO of FDLIC Kris Seale and ALAC President Claude Holloway worked closely together to ensure a smooth transition process for both companies, […]
Propel Funeral Partners, the public company that owns and operates funeral homes, cremation facilities, cemeteries, and related infrastructure in Australia and New Zealand, announced their Fiscal Year 2022 (FY22) results in late August, and did so by showing growth all across their reporting numbers. The company that began in 2012 with 278 funeral services reported 16,537 funeral services in FY22 which is an 18% increase over the 13,916 services conducted in FY2021. The company that now has 144 locations also […]
Service Corporation International (SCI) has agreed to provide up to $209 million in refunds to settle a federal class-action lawsuit alleging it deceived 87,000 Florida customers who purchased its prepaid plans according to this article from last week from Yahoo News. According to the article SCI Direct (formerly called Neptune Society Management Corporation) was named as co-defendant in the class-action suit originally filed by West Palm Beach senior Nancy Taylor in April 2020 in U.S. District Court in Fort Lauderdale. […]
It is our custom at Funeral Director Daily to post the top-read stories of the past 30 days at the middle of every month. Just in case you missed one or two of them. . here they are. In addition we are putting out some information for that you may find useful pertaining to the CANA Peer Network and new offerings from the NFDA’s podcast series, A Brush with Death. Here are Funeral Director Daily’s top-read articles from August 15 […]
