I’ve now moved the Funeral Director Daily home office to our winter rental in Southwest Florida for the next 90 days.  With that comes a few rounds of golf per week and the chance to meet and visit with new people whom I meet on the golf course.

 

It didn’t take me long to have the opportunity to play with a couple of Canadian “snowbirds” and strike up a conversion about the funeral home industry.  Now these two Canadians that I played with this week are not in the Death Care profession but have friends who are.

 

One of them mentioned to me that in his small community which, according to Wikipedia, has a population of 7,466 people his friend who owns the funeral home is looking to get out of the business — not because of profits — but because he cannot find any professional help which renders him on call 24/7 365 days per year.  That level of call is something he no longer is willing to live with.

 

Back in September 2024 Funeral Director Daily published this article titled “Mobility, remote locations may cause lack of services for consumers“.  That article dealt with the city of Prince Rupert, British Columbia, population of over 12,000 people, that no longer had a functioning full-service funeral home for its citizens.  The Northern View, a Prince Rupert publication, published a 3-part story on that situation titled “Prince Rupert’s Death Care crisis” which you can access here.

 

So, with that information as a prelude, I wanted to take a look at employment in general and find what I could on funeral director employment in specific.  I found that it is difficult to find any comparative statistics on the employment situation in funeral homes, but some of the information I found led me to believe the following:

 

The labor market in Death Care is still very tight, but somewhat defined, at least in my viewpoint, by community size.  Even though there were record enrollments in mortuary schools in 2021 and 2022 it does not seem to have made a big dent in bringing funeral homes to full-employment levels in all locales.

 

One reason for that is maybe that more and more funeral directors, like other professions, are retiring early. . . .so mortuary school graduates are are replacing those that retire, instead of adding to their numbers.  This CNBC article points out that more than half (58%) of employees retire earlier than they expected to — it’s interesting to note that this decision is not always by choice — sometimes there are issues, such as health reasons, involved

 

The Jobs Openings and Labor Turnover survey (JOLTS) reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Tuesday showed that both the “hiring” and “quitting” numbers declined in the latest month.  It’s somewhat obvious to me that if less people “quit” their jobs for whatever reason then there would be less “hiring” done to replace them.  It’s also interesting to note that both the “Hires” and “Quits” numbers are as low as they have been since the pandemic.  One school of thought might think that is reflective because employers are unsure of the future economy and don’t want to “Hire” and employees are also wary of the future and don’t want to “Quit”.

 

 

I also took a look at some of the job postings on regional and national funeral home operator websites.  Anecdotally, it appears to me that those posted positions in rural communities tend to stay open longer than those posted positions in urban or suburban communities before a hiring is made.

 

That situation reminds me of the days not too long ago where Health Care employment had the same issues.  And, those Health Care “open employment listings” were more often than not for specialists where being “on call” at least for some time period was essential.  For instance, if a rural area had one physician of a certain specialty that physican had to be on call 24/7 365 days per year — and like the Canadian funeral director might tire of that situation over time.  That “tired” physician then moved to a more urban/suburban area where his call schedule was less rigid.

 

Health Care, in general, solved those issues with consolidation or the hiring of additional specialists (to share the call schedule).

 

I’m wondering, “Is the funeral home business, because of its “on call” necessity going to reach that situation in the rural areas soon?”  If it does, because of the difference in consumer and governmental “spend” between Health Care and Death Care services, I’m not so sure that additional employees can be the solution for funeral homes because of the lack of profitability or ability to raise prices. . . . .meaning “consolidation” may be.

 

Related Article — “New data points to “stable” job market amid “low layoffs, low quits”.  Yahoo Finance

 

More news from the world of Death Care:

• Funeral director and community leader William Villanova shares front-line pandemic journey for NPR’s StoryCorps.  8 News ABC – Richmond (VA)
• Theme park welcomes fresh face (former funeral director) to new role.  Rotherham Advertiser (Great Britain)
• Dozens of Bryce County graves to be removed and reburied.  Video news story and print article.  WBRC News – Birmingham (AL)
• Bargoed Natural Burial site draws families seeking peaceful green final resting place.  Herald-Wales (Great Britain)
• China funeral home asks jobseekers to spend 10 minutes in morgue, sparks public amusement.  South China Morning Post (China)

 

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