Security National Financial Corporation (SNFC), the Utah-based company that serves the Death Care profession through their funeral homes, preneed insurance, and other financial tools issued their 1st Quarter 2026 financial report last week.  In that press release that you can access here you will note that Total Revenues dropped 3.6% from $82.7 million in 1Q2025 to $79.7 million in 1Q2026.

 

However, the company’s after tax earnings on that revenue increased  9.4% for the same comparable period.  After tax earnings for 1Q2026 jumped to $7.0 million as compared to last years number of $6.4 million.

 

Here’s what Scott M. Quist, President and CEO of SNFC said in prepared remarks in the company’s press release, “To have an increase of over 9% in after tax earnings despite a top line decrease is a testament to the operational efficiencies our teams have been implementing over the last several years. Of course we are working diligently to also increase our top line, and that is a stated objective of all of our units.   Nevertheless, improved profitability is the ultimate goal and we did improve profitability.”

 

The Memorial Segment performed just the opposite of the company’s total results.  The segment, which consists of funeral homes and cemeteries, saw their revenue increase 4.4% to $8.47 million on the quarter. . . . However, the segment’s “Earnings before Taxes” dropped 4.0% to $2.14 million in 1Q2026 as compared to $2.23 million in the comparable quarter of 2025.

 

President and CEO Scott M. Quist explained the Memorial segment results in this prepared statement, “Our Funeral Home and Cemetery Segment improved its top line by 4.4% in Q1, but had a decrease in net income. That decrease deserves some explanation. On an operational basis, meaning before investment results, our operating income actually improved some 16% over Q1 2025. This was accomplished primarily by a 35% improvement in preneed cemetery sales. . . . .  The culprit leading to our decrease in net income . . .was our investment income (as opposed to operational income), with the largest factor being unrealized losses in our common stock portfolio. Our Funeral Homes and Cemetery Segment, because of its consistently profitable operations, has a very considerable investment portfolio which we intend to use, as conditions warrant, in financing acquisitions and other future growth.”

 

The SNFC Earnings Call:  The company also held their Earnings Call with analysts last week and you can access that call transcript here.  Here’s the highlights and “low lights” of the Memorial segment of operations as seen through Funeral Director Daily’s lens:

 

The Good:  

• Average funeral sales increased 6.6%
• There was a 22.6% increase in families who selected cremation also choosing memorial or funeral services
• Cemetery revenue increased 18.5%
• The number of pre-need cemetery land contracts increased 15.8%

The Not-so Good:

• Funeral home families served declined 6.7% year over year
• Cemetery placements declined 5.9% year over year
• Investment income decreased 33.5% year over year

 

You can access the complete SNFC earnings call transcript here.

 

Funeral Director Daily take:  Security National was the last of the public funeral home companies to report their 1st Quarter of 2026.  The report is similar to all of the others in that raw numbers of deaths seemed to decline from the 1st Quarter of 2025.  The consensus of the companies who mentioned that in the reports or earnings call transcripts mentioned that the 1st Quarter of 2025 had an unusually high number of deaths and that the deaths in 1Q2026 was more of an “ordinary number” for a quarter.

 

That is probably a correct take on what happened, however, it does make the 2nd Quarter 2026, and the comparables with 2Q2025, something to look forward to.  If it truly was the high number of 1Q2025 deaths that made 1Q2026 comparables look weaker, you would expect a “bounce back” to the norms for 2Q2026 comparables.

 

If you don’t see that happen then maybe there is more going on with market share changes than we have noticed in the past.

 

More news from the world of Death Care:

• Human remains discovered beneath Houston roadwayraise new questions about historic Black cemetery. Video news story and print article.   Click2Houston  (TX)
• New York City cemetery now offers “human composting” – turning corpses into “environmentally sustainable” soil.   UInterview (NY)
• Man lost both of his parents.  Instead of spreading their cremated ashes, he had them turned into pebbles.  People.

 

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