preneed

The savings rate and what it can do for preneed and cemetery sales

By Funeral Director Daily / June 1, 2020 /

It’s not even noon on Sunday yet and I’ve had a pretty good day already.  Minnesota has allowed churches to open at 25% of capacity so my wife and I attended church today, albeit wearing masks and sitting far from anybody else, for the first time since mid-March.  Also, singing was banned for just instrumental…

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Random thoughts: Building market share through preneed. . . .CBS Interactive’s “The Future of Funerals’ series

By Funeral Director Daily / May 28, 2020 /

For almost 40 years our funeral home has had advertising for preneed clientele based on the premise, “Like an umbrella in a sudden shower, some things are good to have before they are needed”.  In different ways on radio, print, and online we go on to explain that preneed funeral insurance is one of those…

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Catching up with Batesville and Assurant

By Funeral Director Daily / May 22, 2020 /

Hillenbrand Industries, parent company of Batesville Casket Company and Assurant, the financial services company that counts it Global Preneed business among its three divisions both reported financial results during early May and we now bring you those results. Batesville Casket, which represents about 20% of the total revenue of Hillenbrand Industries reported an increase of…

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Investors seem wary of death care stocks

By Funeral Director Daily / May 18, 2020 /

We last brought our readers an update on the Funeral Director Daily Death Care Index (DCI) on April 6, 2020, which represented values as of the close of business on Friday, April 3.  As we tell national publications that call us about our DCI, it is not a scientific weighting of public companies in the…

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The world post-COVID

By Funeral Director Daily / May 12, 2020 /

Shortly after the New Year’s bell rang my wife, Angie, and I headed out for one of the joys of retirement. . . extended time in a warm weather location that serves the purpose of shortening what can be fierce Minnesota winters for us.  One of our favorite locations is Hawaii and we left for…

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Time to ramp up Preneed

By Funeral Director Daily / April 23, 2020 /

I’ve seen no data to prove this but anecdotally several people have told me, or I have read, that funeral pre-arrangement sales have drifted downward during the past month or so of sheltering at home due to the coronavirus.  That would only makes sense because many of the clients who pre-arrange are not only seeking…

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Funeral Directors helping funeral directors

By Funeral Director Daily / April 2, 2020 /

When a crisis comes upon you – you have a choice.  You can shudder in a corner or you can face it and do all you can to be part of the solution.  I believe that funeral professionals and funeral business suppliers are those that want to be part of the solution. In that vein…

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Do the Diligence. . . a cautionary tale

By Funeral Director Daily / February 25, 2020 /

Even before Robert Waltrip bought that second location in Houston in the early 1960’s there were lots of funeral homes that changed hands.  And, I’m guessing that over the years about 99% of those business transactions, especially the transferring of a funeral home to a new owner in a small community, went off without a…

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This should never happen

By Funeral Director Daily / February 14, 2020 /

Chalk this incident up to “This should never happen” but it did.  In this article from the Bucks County Courier Times of Pennsylvania we learn of the tale of Richard Geisinger who died in 2013.  The article tells the story of how Mr. Geisinger, who had pre-arrangements for a casketed burial, was instead cremated and…

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Guilty plea, restitution and no jail doesn’t go over well with some pre-need victims

By Funeral Director Daily / January 20, 2020 /

According to this article from the Manistee News, a former funeral home manager has pleaded guilty to taking over $223,000 in pre-need funds.  The plea would assure the defendent, Mr. Denis Johnson, age 69, of Manistee, Michigan, that he would serve no jail time as long as restitution to the approximately 60-70 victims is completed…

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