I read an article the other day that I found in the consumer “Watchdog” section of the Dallas News.  The article that you can read here pertained to a direct mail piece advertising “Free Burials for Eligible Veterans and Spouses”.

That type of ad is not uncommon and if you are in the funeral business you have a pretty good notion of what is coming.  However, if you are not in the funeral business, you may be enticed with another claim that says, “Over $11,000 in savings”.

What really flummoxed the reporter was that there was no telephone number, no website, no address. . . absolutely no indication of where to respond to the ad.  So, “The Watchdog” made like Columbo and investigated the material to try to get an idea who was behind the mailing piece.  It led him to a gentlemen named Mr. Dooley who informed the Watchdog that he was a marketing representative for a local funeral home.

As you can imagine, the mailing piece was intended to give consumers the knowledge that there was no cost at Veteran’s Administration Cemeteries for honorably discharged veterans and then lead into a sales discussion of pre-arranging funeral plans at a certain funeral home prior to the interment.

Unfortunately, for people who received the mailing – and for the funeral home that commissioned such – there was no contact information on the mailing piece.  It was printed and mailed out at considerable expense with no direction to an interested consumer on where to respond.  Mr. Dooley had a couple of comments when confronted with this question by the Dallas News reporter.  A couple of comments were, “I didn’t realize that we didn’t have our web-site on there” and “I should have proofed this better.  I’ll make sure the correct version goes out next time.”

Funeral Director Daily take:  In my book this is a borderline acceptable advertisement as far as transparency and clarity are concerned – even without the mistakes by the marketing consultant.  On one hand, it is smart and courteous to let veterans and their spouses know that they might be eligible for burials at national cemeteries.  On the other hand, a headline of “Free Burials” and then a switch to a discussion of funding pre-arranged funerals is somewhat slippery.  I think professional funeral homes can do better in this regard.

Finally, this is a little warning to independent funeral homes that those people who say that they are “professional” marketers may not be as good as you think they are.  Sometimes a little diligence may be needed before you jump into business deals with them — maybe ask them what colleagues they have worked for and get some references.  It might have saved this funeral home from getting their name mentioned in the paper in an article with “scam” in the headlines.

In today’s world you can purchase mailing lists and design services for your own mailing pieces without having to hire someone to do it for you.  It is not for everyone, but we have designed our pre-need seminar and newspaper advertisements by ourselves for years.

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