Alan Wolfelt is one of the great death care eductors of this generation and when I get a chance to read his works I always learn something.  In the latest edition of NFDA’s The Director magazine Wolfelt authors an article entitled “Efficiency does not equal Effectiveness”.   In that article Wolfelt makes the case that simply doing things efficiently does not always make the result effective.

My take off on the article is from only a small portion of it where he mentioned that funeral home owners, managers, and staff many times “get focused” on what they sold rather than the “experience that they created”.  And, I think he is exactly right when he intimates that we should not get so consumed with “what we sell” rather than how the family “came through the death care experience”.

I actually believe it is in the long-term interests of the funeral home to create a “great experience” for a cremation service today much more so than it is to move the family into simply buying a “high-margin” item.  I remember in my days as a funeral director that many families got it wrong when describing the casket they had for their loved one a year later, but very few got it wrong on an experience, such as a certain song or a dove release, or a balloon release that they wanted as part of the ceremony. . . . . and, most of the time, it was how we carried out this experiential feature that resonated in our “taking care” of the services.

Selling that “high-margin” item may put a few extra dollars in your pocket today, but giving a great experience to the families you are serving may very well pay off with future services down the road.  It’s something that should not be ignored.

In today’s world funeral arrangers have to be creative in the arrangement room. . . . They need the emotional intelligence to figure out “what is it that this family is looking for”?  Then they need to offer solutions, even if those solutions are something that are not popular with their own line of thinking.

Tom Anderson
Funeral Director Daily

For instance, I’m not big on wearing cremation jewelry or not even a fan of “splitting the cremated remains”.  However, I know many families that see splitting the remains or wearing cremation jewelry as an honest memorialization of their loved one.  So, to those families I’m sensing that this may be something of importance I need to let them know about how they can obtain these items. . . .and, what about Parting Stone solidified remains or Better Place Forest burials?  Today’s modern funeral home needs to be up-to-date on how to offer these, and other products, to the consumer public.

What about “non-merchandise” experiences?  Things like dove releases and balloon releases.  Those items in a memorial or funeral service may, in my way of thinking, actually be of more importance than the merchandise purchases to most people.

I’m not real creative but even I could come up with some simple creative ideas that families really appreciated.  Let me tell you about Mr. Meyer.  Mr. Meyer owned the local bowling alley in our small community and I grew up with the Meyer children.  The bowling alley was a gathering place in a small town with a restaurant inside of it.  Anytime you were in that building, including the restaurant section, you would hear the sounds of bowling pins dropping in the background.

When Mr. Meyer died I contacted the local radio announcer and asked if he could make a sound track tape of two hours of bowling pins dropping.  Simple, no problem.  He supplied the tape for our funeral home machine and we played it in the background during the visitation.  I told the family, when they came for private viewing that we had this tape and they would hear it and if they didn’t like it we would switch to visitation bacground music.

That funeral was 20-years ago and I’m guessing that none of the Meyer children remember what casket their dad was in. . . however, when I run into them they invariably tell me about all the people that commented on the bowling alley soundtrack.

So, I agree with Alan Wolfelt, those funeral homes and funeral arrangers that can effectively create a “meaningful experience” for the families they serve will be those funeral homes that continue to draw consumers to their doors.  I think it is fair to say that “tradition may be the experience for some” but in today’s day and age, flexibility and the ability to create personalized experiences for those who lose loved ones will be the future to becoming the heritage death care provider of the future.

More news from the world of Death Care:

• The cost of dying is going up, leaving some Florida families scrambling.  South Florida Sentinel (FL)
• “It’s about capturing humaness”:  The future of funerals, from VR Codes to hydrocremations.  Time Out (United Kingdom)
• Ready to serve the community:  Moravec Johnson Mortuary’s Libby Scott now a funeral director.  The Banner-Press (NE)
• AM Best affirms credit ratings of Homesteaders Life Company.  Morningsta

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