Business

Annual budgeting. . .bringing in the revenue

By Funeral Director Daily / November 12, 2019 /

Yesterday we started the talk of annual budgeting for a funeral home by looking at what are the expectations for overhead, profit, and a savings plan in that budget.  You can see yesterday’s article here.  Today, we will try to explain how we set the revenue parameters to make sure that we have a great…

It’s November. . . have you set your budget for the new year

By Funeral Director Daily / November 11, 2019 /

I live in Minnesota and every year when the calendar turned over into November I had two thoughts. . . Five months of winter ahead and time to make sure the income and expense budget for the funeral home is set up for the new year ahead. I operated a funeral home that over time…

Do You Know Your Funeral Home’s “Credit” Score

By Funeral Director Daily / November 8, 2019 /

Think about it; your online reviews and subsequent online reputation can be looked at as your funeral home’s credit score. It seems many funeral home owners believe that a single bad review won’t hurt them. Nothing is further from the truth. In this new online world, information is posted, shared and transmitted constantly between individuals…

Just in time for Halloween

By Funeral Director Daily / October 31, 2019 /

Leave it to a couple of iconic names in the business news world to connect the death care profession with Halloween.  Although you should probably expect it, we came across a couple of articles today that link our livelihoods with the October 31 holiday. First, from Forbes.  In this article you can read about “13…

Veteran’s Day is approaching. . . here’s how one funeral home is honoring veterans

By Funeral Director Daily / October 25, 2019 /

I was reminded that Veteran’s Day 2019 is fast approaching as it is November 11.  It is a day set aside to thank our nation’s veterans for service given and sacrifices made to protect the freedoms of our great nation. I recently came upon an article on how the Drennan & Ford Funeral Home in…

Life stories. . . . .that’s one way we can transform

By Funeral Director Daily / October 25, 2019 /

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a column for Funeral Director Daily entitled, “How will we transform”?  The article was based on the fact that Hillenbrand Industries, parent company of Batesville Casket Company, knows that its casket business will not be its bread and butter forever, and is transforming itself over time to a…

2nd generation family members make their mark

By Funeral Director Daily / October 23, 2019 /

Today we will bring you a couple of stories we recently saw in the news pertaining to some things that are happening with a couple of 2nd generation New York state family funeral home operators. The first story deals with 27-year old Ryan Frary and his purchase of the Stuart-Fortune-Keough Funeral Home in Tupper Lake,…

A tale of two funeral homes

By Funeral Director Daily / October 21, 2019 /

Over the weekend I noticed two newspaper articles from small town newspapers that involved two separate funeral homes of different size and history.  However, in reading the articles and doing a little research by going to the websites of the companies, I noticed something in common. What I noticed in common, quite frankly, has to…

Calculating the environmental costs. . . what matters most?

By Funeral Director Daily / October 17, 2019 /

The article begins, “Cremation and ground burial both have carbon footprints that have some people looking for other options for the afterlife.”  That sentence pulled me in but what I went on to watch and read in this video and news story from Chemical & Engineering News pertaining to the “new” death care economy that…

California, wildfires, and funeral home generators

By Funeral Director Daily / October 14, 2019 /

Many of you know that I live in west central Minnesota in a small community virtually equidistant between Minneapolis and Fargo, North Dakota.  Our area, over the years has had some powerful and destructive tornadoes, but they are quick and generally affect only a small destructive path.  If you happen to be in that 2-5…