August 31, 2010
Always wanted to “rock on” after death? Why not have your cremated remains pressed into vinyl records?
The company, And Vinyly, supposedly makes records from cremated remains.
Check out their website at: http://www.andvinyly.com/
According to their materials, a complete custom pressing, with music you provide, will cost about two thousand pounds ($3074.68 at current conversion rates) for about 30 of the vinyl discs.
via BoingBoing
July 1, 2010
June 29, 2010
In mid-July, I packed up the Prius and headed to Tampa for the 2010 Independent Funeral Directors of Florida conference and expo.
This was our fourth year attending the show, so I didn’t know what kind of response we would get. Here were my major questions:
Would our customers need any more covers?
Would there be any new customers left for us to sell?
How would our new dressing table skirt systems be received?
Would we sell any dressing table skirt systems?
I left my facility on the morning of the event. Exhibitors would be allowed to begin loading at noon, with the doors of the hall opening for visitors at 5:00 pm that evening. The trip to the convention center took about two hours, allowing me to arrive just as they opened the loading dock for exhibitors to begin setting up.
Because I registered late for the show – hadn’t decided by mid-June if we’d attend again – I did not have the best choice of booth space. In fact, the organizers had sold so many spots that the only space left was in the lobby near the registration area. I was concerned about this setup, but I convinced myself that we’d still see everyone, even if we had to work extra hard to get them to hang out with us outside of all the main action. I was beginning to rethink this strategy at the end of the first session.
Basic tenant of trade show booth placement: don’t be too far away from the main action. In fact, I would rather have been in the hall on a far wall in the corner than in the lobby. Why? Because everyone rushed past the eight booths in the lobby so they could get into the exhibit hall, which, incidentally, was the location of all the food, the bar and their friends.
So the typical attendee spent an hour or two in the exhibit hall, shooting the breeze with his friends, until his wife says, “Let’s go,” and he moves to leave. By this time, he’s disengaged himself from the trade show, and just as he has closed his mind to looking at any more products, he walks out the door and sees 8 more booths.
Needless to say, most of these guys were not going to stop to talk to any of us.
Our first day was very slow, with very few people talking with us. The exhibit hall was rocking, but the exhibitors in the lobby were starting to wonder why they had paid the same amount as the people in the larger room.
We ended the evening with no sales. First convention I’ve ever done where we sold NOTHING during a session. As you might imagine, I was concerned and, if I’m truthful, a bit depressed about it.
It’s hard enough to risk hundreds or thousands of dollars and days away from your business to generate sales, but spending money and producing nothing is terribly discouraging.
(NOTE: This post has been hard to write, since I haven’t been posting here regularly. Sorry for the crappy writing. Hopefully it will improve as I “up” my writing frequency.)
Luckily, I didn’t spend lots of money on a hotel room, since my sister and sister-in-law live in Tampa. After a short drive and a “healthy” double-quarter-pounder meal (supersized, of course), I arrived at my sister’s house and crashed for the night.
The event started again the next morning and our results were better. First, the organizers, to their credit, moved the desserts for lunch to the lobby, giving the attendees a reason to visit us after they finished their lunch. Second, the day was less rushed, with visitors having more time to chat with vendors.
Fortunately, several of my old customers stopped by to see what’s new and we showed off our new dressing table skirt system. Orders started coming slowly, with our first being to a funeral director who had seen our product but held off because he had questions about durability.
As the day went on, we slowly added orders. By the close of business and the end of the show, we had written more orders than the previous year. I breathed a pretty big sigh of relief and started packing up to head home.
Here’s how the show finances ended:
Booth: $375
Fuel: $25
Food: $50
Misc.: $50
TOTAL EXPENSES: $500
TOTAL SALES: $2000 (10 items)
Typically, I budget $50 for trade show marketing from each item I sell. So, spending $500 to attend the show meant I needed to sell 10 items. Which we did (barely).
For contrast, the last IFDF show we attended (IFDF 2009 Wrap-Up) cost $242, meaning we’d have to sell 5 covers to meet the budget. Of course, I received a complimentary booth for that show, which, had I been required to pay the full cost, would have made our expenses more than $600 and meant we needed to sell 12 covers.
We sold 11 items at the 2009 IFDF show and 10 this year. I think we’re staying on track with IFDF. And I can’t stop going to this show, since it’s usually in my backyard (next year? Orlando) and I know the funeral directors so well.
As for the answers to those questions? Here we go:
Would our customers need any more covers?
More than half of our sales were to customers who had ordered before.
Would there be any new customers left for us to sell?
We did, indeed, meet two new customers who were excited to try our products.
How would our new dressing table skirt systems be received?
Our previous customers loved the skirts and ordered right away. They even ordered additional covers to match.
Would we sell any dressing table skirt systems?
We sold two systems, with two more orders coming in the next weeks following the event.
In all, it was a good event, despite the near heart-attack the first day’s response gave me.
April 23, 2010
Recently attended a visitation followed by a service at one of the local funeral homes. The deceased was to be cremated, but the family saw the value in having his body present for viewing and a service.
As I was leaving, I chatted with the funeral director and complimented him on the service. I even teased him that having to work such a late services (went until almost 9 pm) is hard on his own family. Then he said something that reminded me how much change the trend toward cremation has brought to the industry. He said:
“I used to spend four nights a week on the visitation team. Now, we’re lucky if we can convince people to see the body before cremation.”
We chatted some more. Turns out he misses how often he used to stand for visitations. He wishes he had more visitations and he knows that educating his public is the only way to encourage more viewings in the future.
“My staff presents all the options and we tell families that we truly believe that some kind of viewing is beneficial for their friends and loved ones, but these economic times are really affecting my customers,” he shared.
At the end of the day, his bottom line is affected also. Having a big funeral home with multiple viewing rooms and state-of-the-art technology isn’t cheap. At the same time, he is worried that if direct cremation with no viewing becomes the norm, more than just the funeral industry will be damaged; he believes that the basic need to “say goodbye” is harmed, even if people, driven by the economics of it all, don’t realize what they’re losing.
I agree with him. And while I have an awfully pessimistic view of the future of the industry, I think there’s a lot individual funeral directors can do to educate their community. I just wish I had the answer to fix the problem.
April 23, 2010
In early March, we loaded up the convention Prius (I traded the convention wagon for one with better gas mileage after I figured out that everything would fit in the new car) and headed to Atlanta for a chance to sell our quilted cot covers and a new item, our dressing table skirts, to the gathered funeral directors.
We left around 11:00 am on Sunday, February 28th, with a plan to hit I-75 by noon. As my traveling companions know, my favorite fast food places are Chipotle and Zaxby’s. As luck would have it, there’s a new Zaxby’s at I-75 near Ocala, Florida, so we pulled in and split a chicken finger plate (they make awesome chicken).
On the road again by 12:30, we spun up the Prius (0-60 in less than 15 seconds!) and headed toward the bright lights of Atlanta.
We dropped our bags in the hotel room by 6:00 pm – the Prius takes a while to get to cruising speed but it doesn’t mind keeping up with traffic once it gets there – and decided on dinner. If you remember my last few trips through Atlanta, you’ll know that my favorite restaurant in the state of Georgia is Pappasito’s Cantina (2009 Georgia Expo Day 2 and Results).
My fellow roadtripper, Robin Richter, who went with me to the 2007 NFDA Convention in Vegas (Robin Richter Shares “My Experience at the NFDA Convention”), had never been to Pappasito’s, which made it all the more enjoyable for me to share the great place with her. She called her husband afterward to tell him that if they got close to Atlanta again, they had better stop at Pappasito’s!
The expo wasn’t scheduled to start until Monday at Noon, so I was happy to get into town a day early and rest before the big two-day event. I prefer to have everything set up the day before, but the Georgia Railway Depot is easy to access and I new that setup would only take about 1.5 hours. We got finished early and had a delicious breakfast at the Waffle House at Underground Atlanta.
I’ll share more info soon about how many covers we sold and what our expenses looked like. In the meantime, here’s a picture of our booth:
February 25, 2010
My favorite blog, Boing Boing, featured the collection of Hayden Peters, who runs a site called Art of Mourning.
In an interview with Collectors Weekly, Historian and Collector Hayden Peters charts the evolution of mourning jewelry from the 16th century through its most prolific period during the reign of Queen Victoria.
Here’s an excerpt from their interview:
Collectors Weekly: So, just to be clear, is mourning jewelry considered a type of funeralia?
Peters: Yes. Some pieces are obviously made with the funeral in mind. In the 16th century, it wasn’t unheard of to leave an allocation in your will for the construction of mourning jewelry to be given to the loved ones at the funeral. To me that’s funeralia. That’s an accessory of mourning and part of the pomp and showiness of the funeral itself.
There were other things, though, that may be considered mourning but not funeralia. For example, I don’t consider the neoclassical stuff to be real funeralia, but it all falls under that umbrella. Funeralia, itself, is another world. You have the actual cemetery, the burial, and God knows what. It has so many facets. I think the jewelry fits in there in some way.
February 22, 2010
Here’s a few pictures submitted to Oddly Specific, which highlights some interesting and, occasionally unintended, comedy in signage:
February 18, 2010
February 15, 2010
Order of the Golden Rule (OGR) is a trade organization of independent funeral homes. Here’s how they describe themselves:
Founded in 1928, OGR’s mission is to make independent funeral homes exceptional. We do this by building and supporting member interaction, information exchange and encourating professional business development through a wide range of programs, services and resources.
OGR also negotiates discounts for their members with various industry suppliers. I recently received an email from a company that is a Golden Services Group supplier (OGR’s designation for companies that participate in their discount program). This email was sent to many GSG suppliers, including our company, because we currently offer a discount through the program. Here’s the text:
Has anyone else read the last sentence of the paragraph that I’ve copied from the OGR’s email? I’ve written Connie and Diane an email as I think this goes against the commitment that we’ve made over the years to OGR as being a representative in our respective product offerings. If all competitors are allowed to attend, the distinction as a GSG Supplier is gone.
EXCERPT FROM OGR’S EMAIL: “As a GSG Member, you have the first option to select a tabletop in this year’s showcase. Please make your reservation using the Supplier Showcase Registration Form. Also included is a floor plan to make your choices, preliminary conference schedule and other details about the showcase. After February 26, OGR will open this year’s showcase to all prospective industry suppliers.”
In effect, the writer is concerned that opening the show to competitors hurts the GSG supplier that has faithfully supplied a great discount to members for several years. I tend to agree with the writer and voiced as much in a reply.
Then, OGR wrote eveyone to clarify the issue. Here’s a snippet from their email:
The practice of opening up the Supplier Showcase to non-GSG suppliers was started last year at OGR’s Annual Conference in Nashville. Last year GSG suppliers had first option to purchase a tabletop. We had 5 new companies exhibit who were not in the GSG group because they paid to exhibit in the space that GSG suppliers did not purchase. Again this year, GSG suppliers will be given preferred placement, along with special signage recognizing their company as a member of GSG.
There are 60 GSG supplier members to fill the 35 tabletop exhibits at this year’s conference. Your commitment to participate in the showcase and provide options for the products and services our members ask for and need is essential. Providing the space and related events for a Supplier Showcase is a costly and involved endeavor on the part of any association, but it is one that allows OGR members the opportunity to explore new products that will help them be better at what they do as funeral professionals. Our role is to help make them and their businesses exceptional. Your support of the Supplier Showcase is also toward that end.
Ms. Haymes:It is unfortunate that you are unable to get even 35 of the 60 suppliers to exhibit at the show and, therefore, need to open the expo to outside companies.
Perhaps you’d find it beneficial to have the perspective of one of GSG suppliers about this situation? If so, here’s my take.Our company gives a great discount (15%) to your members. I’m also required to pay a percentage to GSG for the pleasure of selling to your members.In return, you occasionally mention my products to your members through the magazine, your annual resource book and in faxes and emails.I’m glad that this has been a percentage arrangement, because if I were required to pay you a flat fee every year, I’d have ended our relationship after the first year.How much business do I get from OGR members? Less than 1% of my annual sales come from your group.As a marketing plan, being active in OGR has done little for my business. Your magazine ad rates are comparable to other trade publications, but your distribution is MUCH, MUCH less. I can’t offer a “hurry, sale ends soon!” call to action in your magazine because your members already get a substantial discount.We plan our trade show attendance by factoring things like cost, location and attendance. Frankly, even a simple review of your show tells me that I can’t make my money back. Consider, first, the cost of travel. Two of us attending will cost $850 for travel (air, hotel, car) if we stay in the cheapest place and drive the economy car. Then, we’ll have to pay $749 for the first person and $450 for the second to attend the show. Factor in meals ($100 if we stick with fast food and IHOP) and we’re over $2000 without putting gas in the rental or other incidental costs.All that to reach a few hundred OGR members from behind a 6′ table for less than 1 hour of uninterrupted time on Friday and during a 90 minute lunch on Saturday.To contrast, I recently spent half that amount to get five hours of uninterrupted time with over 400 funeral directors in South Carolina. And I had a real 10′x10′ booth. The booth itself costs me less than $600. And the show planners quickly filled every space.I don’t mind paying for high-quality leads. I spend thousands to exhibit at the NFDA show each year. But I expect value for my dollar, which means space, uninterrupted time and adequate foot traffic.Right now, your show’s numbers don’t cut it, so I won’t be exhibiting.But I like OGR. I have good friends who are members. I think you are trying to do good work. It’s just not beneficial to your suppliers (at least this one) right now.Best of luck in the future.
February 9, 2010
We’ve shown this cover off at conventions, but haven’t gotten much response. Still, I like to look of it and plan to have it available at the next conventions we attend. What do you think of it? Too specific?
February 8, 2010
It’s been a whirlwind around here lately, with planning for two conventions and a monster opening month for 2010. Doing all of it leaves little time for talking about all that we’re doing!
We had our best January ever, with the combo of January-February shaping up to the be the best two month period in our history, outside of a national convention.
Helping out our February numbers has been our trip to the South Carolina Funeral Directors Association Expo, held in Columbia on Tuesday, February 2nd and Wednesday, February 3rd.
The EXPO, which featured a wide range of vendors, attracted a great crowd of funeral directors from South Carolina and a few from neighboring states. I even saw Bill Wappner, current NFDA President and one of our customers from Ohio.
We entered the show with a goal to sell 20 cot covers. Our goals, which help us measure success during and after the show, are based upon our expenses for the event and the expected turnout. I normally budget $50 per cover sold toward the cost of attending.
While I initially planned on spending about $1000 to attend the EXPO, our final numbers look like this:
BOOTH: $600
FUEL: $75
MEALS: $130
OTHER: $50
——————-
TOTAL: $855
By my $50 standard, we needed to sell 17 covers to pay for the show.
Any wonder, then, that we sold 17?
Now, I don’t count sales by our wholesale customers, even if they are generated at the show, but one of the companies that retails our product did sell two covers to a customer.
So we fell short of our goal, but we were still able to pay for the show with sales.
Here’s a list of the conventions we’ve attended, which includes the costs for each and the goals we set because of those costs. You’ll see that the two conventions where we missed out goals by a wide margin were two years of the Kentucky show. Also, the last three convention are in the future, so the expenses are only educated guesses at this point.
| CONVENTION | DATE | BOOTH | HOTEL | TRAVEL | MEALS | PROMO | MISC. | TOTAL | GOAL | ACTUAL |
| Kentucky FDA | 6/25/2008 | $570 | $490 | $420 | $240 | $90 | $187 | $1,997 | 40 | 32 |
| NFDA | 10/12/2008 | $4,800 | $280 | $100 | $300 | $100 | $100 | $5,680 | 114 | 153 |
| Georgia Expo | 3/1/2009 | $550 | $248 | $110 | $165 | $50 | $50 | $1,173 | 23 | 22 |
| Ohio FDA | 5/25/2009 | $650 | $360 | $325 | $200 | $50 | $100 | $1,685 | 34 | 46 |
| IFDF | 6/12/2009 | $0 | $102 | $40 | $65 | $25 | $35 | $267 | 5 | 11 |
| Kentucky FDA | 6/24/2009 | $570 | $500 | $300 | $360 | $50 | $150 | $1,930 | 39 | 15 |
| NFDA | 10/22/2009 | $2,500 | $550 | $800 | $300 | $150 | $600 | $4,900 | 98 | 113 |
| SCFDA | 2/2/2010 | $600 | $0 | $75 | $130 | $0 | $50 | $855 | 17 | 17 |
| Georgia Expo | 3/1/2010 | $500 | $250 | $70 | $70 | $0 | $60 | $950 | 19 | |
| Ohio FDA | 4/27/2010 | $625 | $360 | $175 | $125 | $50 | $60 | $1,395 | 28 | |
| IFDF | 6/10/2010 | $300 | $0 | $25 | $50 | $0 | $50 | $425 | 9 |
Since our biggest non-booth expense for most of our conventions is lodging, finding a place to stay in our host cities is a nice benefit that saves serious money.
In South Carolina, I was fortunate enough to have family living in Columbia. For the IFDF’s 2010 show, I’ll stay with my sister in Tampa. I may be able to save money on the Ohio convention, if I can convince my good friend Albert to let me crash on his couch.
No matter how the next few conventions shake out, we expect to be able to continue getting close to our goals (or exceeding them) because of the great response we’re getting to our quilted cot covers.
Of course, I’ll continue to closely monitor our progress and adjust accordingly. Stay tuned!
January 25, 2010
Heads up to our friends attending the South Carolina Funeral Directors Association Conference and Expo: we’ll be there!
We’re heading North to show off our quilted cot covers to the great funeral directors in South Carolina. I’m excited, since the organizers tell me that funeral directors from at least three other states regularly attend the show. In fact, I’ve heard from a number of other exhibitors that South Carolina is one of the best Southern shows to attend.
Truth is, we were disappointed by last year’s Kentucky expo and did not expect to attend many other small shows. Our NFDA presence has been such a great benefit to us that we considered sticking to larger expos and forgetting about the smaller venues.
But then we took a long hard look at our last couple of shows, including the Ohio, Georgia and Florida shows, and came to a surprising conclusion: small shows are usually just as profitable as the big ones!
Oh, but one caveat: only for the first two years. After that, we have to either find a new product to push or take a year or two off.
Our Independent Funeral Directors of Florida expos were great the first two years, but the third year saw a dropoff, mostly because we’d already sold covers to every funeral director at the show. Our pool of potential new customers shrank every time we sold to another person from the group.
So we’re planning to roll out our dressing table skirt design at the IFDF show in June. In fact, we’d like to show it off at the Georgia Expo in early March, but I’m giving my team time to get everything squared away without crazy pressure.
This South Carolina expo, February 2-3, is going to cost us less than $1000 to attend. First, we’re staying with my uncle, who lives in Columbia, so no hotel room. The rent of the booth itself is just shy of $600 and my Prius sips gas sparingly, so we should be able to make it there and back on just over two tanks of gas. Add to the total some food and other incidentals and I’m thinking $800 or so for the entire event.
After we get back, we’ve got just a few weeks to process all the orders and head out to the Georgia Expo, which is March 1st and 2nd in Atlanta.
Come see us at a show! Remember, we always give a healthy discount for Expo orders.
January 19, 2010
I read a lot of blogs. My feed reader has almost 50 blogs in it and I try to read something from each of them on a regular basis. True, there are some blogs that update more often and, because they’re more interesting, get my attention every day. Other bloggers update every few weeks, but I keep them in my feed reader because they’re just so darned interesting.
One of my favorite bloggers, a down-to-earth guy named Trent, writes “The Simple Dollar,” a blog about personal finances. Three years ago, he blogged about tackling 101 Goals in 1,001 Days.
Now, he didn’t quite make it, but he managed 52 of them and is donating money to charity to make up for the others (that was goal #26).
In a similar vein, and because it clearly worked well for him, I am planning 50 goals in 500 days. Now, I hear your question: Why fewer goals and fewer days?
First, fewer goals is more obtainable. And while Trent might not have a big issue with not actually finishing, I’d like to cross everything off that list.
Second, I already have long-term goals, many of which, conveniently, are set to end in the next few years. 500 days works out to early June 2011, which allows me to set a lot of incremental goals that will track along with my overall big goals and get me there in the timeframe I’ve set up.
Only problem? I haven’t even started writing the goals yet! Anyone want to make some suggestions?
I know one of my first goals is going to be writing a book. I started one, which never quite panned out. I’ve got part of a fiction book written and I want to finish it. But what I’m really excited about is a book that develops from interviews with funeral directors.
In short, I want to write about the habits, plans and goals of effective and successful funeral directors. What makes them great businesspeople, how they handle their unique jobs and how the industry has changed, including the challenges now facing their firms.
So look for my goals in the next few days. And comment with some suggestions. I gotta find 50, remember?
January 12, 2010
The quilted cot cover business that started in my one-car garage in 2003 has seen some pretty impressive growth in the past. During the first few years of our business, sales tripled annually. Then, as the business began to mature and we gained a foothold in the industry, our growth “mellowed” to a still-impressive 50% more each year.
2008 looked like a plateau, with the year ending with 10% more sales than the previous year. And while it was a good omen, I was still sad to see the days of 50% increases end.
After a rocky start to 2009, where year-to-date sales in the first six months were off by as much as 30% from the previous year, we began rebounding in August. Steady gains in September and October – helped along by the 2009 NFDA Convention & Expo – prepared us for an absolutely crazy November and December.
How good was the upswing in business? We ended 2009 with more than 10% greater sales than 2008!
That’s right, in a down year, when most businesses are struggling to keep the doors open, we added 10% more sales.
So how did we do it?
First, we are fastidious (I love that word) about tracking our sales numbers and comparing our current figures with previous results. On any given day, I check how we are doing compared with the same month in past years as well as how we are doing compared to the past month.
While January and February were off the 2008 numbers, March saw an increase, which might have bolstered my spirits, if a healthy portion of that hadn’t been due to the Georgia Expo we attended. I am careful to track how much of our business comes from conventions, wholesale customers and the website, so I knew that while our convention business was bringing in new sales, our other avenues were falling off.
April and May were not any better, but by that time we’d already begun a recovery plan.
First, I reached out to our wholesale customers, the ones who resell our product on their websites, through their sales reps and in their catalogs. We offered an even-better wholesale discount during the summer, hoping to jumpstart our wholesale customers’ sales machinery. I also began seeking out new resellers to add to our list.
In June, we signed up three new regional supply companies to resell our product. Their exuberance about the product helped spark sales and the rebound began in earnest in August.
We also worked harder on the website, fixing some bugs in the search engine optimization and adding new designs to our offerings. The new covers, while not huge sellers so far, have bolstered our line, filling in a few gaps left by discontinued fabrics that we can no longer get from our suppliers.
In September, we added “morgue cart covers” to our website, in hopes of capturing more of the hospital market. Many hospitals use a cart with a metal-tubed framework to cover the body. This has a fitted fabric cover over the top, giving the cart the appearance of an empty draped table. Interestingly, the companies that sell the carts do a lot of advertising on the Internet about their great tables, but they never tell you how to buy a replacement when the one you have starts to look like crap.
We’re using our FluidBlocker nylon fabric to create lightweight covers that meet both OSHA and infection control requirements. So far, we’ve sold several dozen of them are we’re looking for ways to get the word out to hospitals around the country.
The 2009 NFDA Expo exposed us to a number of new customers, with 113 covers sold during the convention. Since then, we’ve been riding a wave that the convention created, with many new customers calling months later to buy “that great cover we saw at the convention.”
Like most companies, we spent a lot of 2009 cutting costs, re-evaluating our core expenses and rethinking strategy. Because of intelligent decisions, a reluctance to shout “the sky is falling!” and an industry that believes in our product, we came out of 2009 better than we started.
How about you? Did you take time during 2009 to differentiate yourself from your competitor? Did you rethink your basic plan and search for new markets for your compassionate brand of funeral care? Did you buckle down and cut some unnecessary spending?
If you’re still looking for something to improve your firm’s appearance and set you apart from your competition, why not consider one of our beautiful quilted cot covers? They’re affordable, amazingly versatile (and protective, thanks to our great lining) and guaranteed to add comfort to any removal.
Visit our product site at www.cotcovers.com.
January 6, 2010
Anyone else host or attend a holiday remembrance service this year?
I went to one hosted by a good friend of mine at his corporate funeral home. It was on a cold, rainy night. I was amazed at how many of his clients braved the wet streets and construction (his company is building him a beautiful new facility) to attend the short service.
They read all of the names of those they had served the previous year and had a wonderful caroling group in period costume sing some beautiful songs while they lit candles in commemoration. They ended with a prayer and a word from the funeral director.
In past years, he’s asked families to decorate a tree with an ornament they had made, he’s given away dove ornaments to everyone who attended and held candlelight services in the cemetery attached to his funeral home.
No matter what he’s done, the people who attend – sometimes hundreds, sometimes less – are touched by the gesture of remembrance and reaffirm their bond with his firm and his staff.
Is it any wonder that his funeral home continues to grow each year?
December 31, 2009
Batesville makes caskets, right? They’ve been making them for a while. They make a lot of them. They have lots of customers and they have an impressive distribution system in place.
According to Ryan Thogmartin from Connecting Directors, Batesville has just bought the intellectual rights to Goria Corporation, a company that, until the sale, made molded vaults from what I suspect is some type of plastic or polycarbonate or other rigid but lightweight material. Here’s the letter from the Goria website that describes the sale:
To our valued customers and supporters:
For the past five years, Goria Corporation has been pleased to produce and sell our patented Eonian™ and Endurance™ burial vaults to funeral service providers across the country. During this time, we’ve gotten to know many funeral directors who appreciate our revolutionary products and share our commitment to delivering value to families.
My purpose in writing today is to advise you of a change in our business. Effective November 16, 2009. Goria sold the molds and intellectual property rights on which our vaults are produced. Goria has closed its burial vault business and have ceased all manufacturing operations and will no longer be a supplier of burial vaults. For a number of reasons, we felt the time was appropriate and are confident we made the right decision in choosing the reputable organization we sold too.
On behalf of my family and our staff, we appreciate your business and are thankful for the support you have given us.If you have questions about our selling the molds, patent rights or closing our burial vault business, please feel free to contact Pierre Goria at info@goriacorp.com or call 336-697-0189 ext. 301.
I met Pierre a few years ago at an expo and he was excited about using rotational molding of plastic to transform the way vaults are made and sold. Because of the lower weight, he was able to create his vaults in one factory and ship them across the country for a reasonable cost, making competition with concrete vault companies possible and profitable.
So let’s get back to the part where Batesville spends some cash to buy his molds and intellectual property. See, his company makes a lot more than vaults. So he didn’t sell them everything, just the vault part of the business.
Does it mean he no longer wanted to make vaults? Does it mean that no one else will make these kinds of vaults? Not necessarily, on either count.
Now, I haven’t spoken to Pierre, but I know how excited he was about his product and how convinced he was that funeral homes would see the benefits of his kind of vault. And I know that if Batesville is serious about shifting the industry toward a mass-produced, centrally-manufactured vault, selling his intellectual property was a great way to get the product into the marketplace in a big, big way.
From a businessperson’s view, he made a great move. Batesville has the resources to push the product in a much-greater way that he ever could have. They have the means to compensate him for his hard work to create the product and begin marketing it. Even better, he still owns his original company.
Ryan Thogmartin brings us a great perspective from the vault world when he states:
Maybe the story interests me more because I am also in the burial vault business, but regardless, if Batesville decides to take on burial vaults they could make a big impact on the burial vault world. Just think of the ramifications, if Batesville switched all their customers over to using their burial vault?
What do you think the impact could be?
Well, Ryan, I think it’s going to have a big impact. I doubt that Batesville would have spent cash to acquire this knowledge if it didn’t intend to use it to create a product line.
Yes, sometimes companies buy a product to kill it, but Goria wasn’t competing with Batesville because Batesville doesn’t make vaults. Yet.
In fact, if Batesville had never intended to enter the vault world, they would have little reason to even know that Goria existed.
In my estimation, Batesville either wanted to get into the vault business and decided that buying the intellectual property outright was easier that fighting a protracted patent battle later or saw this as an easy way to add a product to their already-impressive distribution network.
So yes, Ryan, I think the vault business is in for a big shakeup. Most affected, I think, will be vault companies who sell a large amount of product to the corporates, as they will be the easiest for Batesville to convert in large numbers. Batesville clearly already has a wide-reaching relationship with management at the corporations, so convincing them to make the switch won’t be hard.
But what about all the unafilliated firms? How will Batesville convince them?
First, maybe Batesville doesn’t need to convert that many to create a viable product line. I’m sure that the business from SCI alone would make it highly attractive to launch the product.
And once the product is launched and used in some funeral homes, others will try it out. If Batesville can deliver a similar level of customer service, I think smaller vault companies have reason for concern.
But that brings us to the biggest issue facing any business: how good is your customer service?
Someone can always create a cheaper product, copy your product features or create a better product. And that may convince some folks to switch. But for a repeat purchase, such as vaults or urns or caskets, the delivery experience and customer service are very, very important.
Batesville deals with funeral homes now. What happens when they have to learn to deliver to cemeteries? How will they interact with cemetery staff? In smaller cemeteries, who will handle the opening and closing? Will they sign up a bunch of small vault companies to sell their product? Can Batesville handle the customer service for so many new customers, like the cemeteries who will be in line to buy their vaults?
There are a lot of questions still to be answered. And to be fair, I rushed this post out with very little preparation, so you’re getting my “stream of consciousness” ramblings here.
It will be interesting to see how Batesville rolls out their line of vaults, which I think is inevitable. Even more interesting will be the reaction of current vault sellers.
December 31, 2009
It’s that time of year again! No, not the time where we dance naked in the moonlight to celebrate the winter solstice. Unless, of course, any of you are Wiccans, in which case, by all means, dance away. Just remember, it’s pretty cold out there, so start a fire or something. But not a raging forest fire, those are bad.
Wait, where were we?
Oh yeah, it’s time for a “best of” recap of 2009.
I’ve reviewed the blog, noticed how seldom I’ve posted in the last few months, and, after scolding myself, compiled what I consider to be the best posts of the previous year. Here they are, in chronological order:
January
Hey, Vendors. Stop Telling Me How Hungry You Are.
Just Another Celebrity Cremation
Are You Still Conducting Processions?
February
Nobody Cares About the Jones
Minnesota Funeral Director Opens Up About Effects of Cremation
March
2009 Georgia Expo Day 2 and Results
Why You Can’t Protect “Ideas” in Business
Quantity Can Produce Quality
Choosing the Right Convention Opportunities
April
Making Money with Online Memorials
Dale Clock Shares a Review of ICCFA Expo 2009
Why I Joined the Eternal Space Advisory Council
Charles Cowling Comments on My Affinity for Eternal Space
May
Ohio FDA Expo Preparations Are Under Way
OFDA 2009: Expenses
June
EternalSpace Not So Eternal After All?
Eustis Historical Museum: Something Borrowed
Eternal Space: a Debacle?
My Letter to Thomas Parmalee About EternalSpace
Great “Almost Obituary” for Michael Jackson
July
Elite Uniforms is Open for Business!
August
How Many People Will you Meet at the NFDA Convention?
Last Minute Preparations for NFDA 2009
September
Cremation Continues Its Unrelenting March
October
Exhibitor Advice
November
2009 NFDA Convention: The Whole Story
December
Anyone Hiring a “Corpse Beautician”?
December 18, 2009
I received an interesting email today. At first, I thought it was a joke. But the writer is serious. Here’s the email:
Hello Tim,
I am very glad to find you and your posts on the internet and your website. I am writing to ask you for help in finding employment. I am a licensed Estetician and am interested in the position of Corpse Beautician. I have been working with the public and applying make up for over 5 years and now find I am interested in this aspect of Estetics. However I have been researching online and not finding anything. Looking at online funderaljobs.com and places like that I have used their search windows and not found anything remotely called ‘corpse beautician’. I have also not found anything like this job description in the long list of funeral jobs in existance.
What I mean to express is that not for looking can I find even on the internet the job of corpse beautician or related position. Do I just not know the official name of this job? Do I just not know the category under which this job is listed? Is it that there is just no listings for this position at this time and my timing is bad?
I live in Houston Texas and I would like to transfer my skills in Estetics to the funeral industry. I don’t know if my serach criteria is bad or if the market is non-existant at this time. Is this position in funeral homes so rare and should I make a point of calling each individually and ask if they employ such persons? Do I need to sell myself and my skills as a new service to a unexposed area?
I simply can’t ascertain the market in my area nor online as I get no results from google searching.
If you have any advice how to approach the market or funeral homes directly and/or how I should go about getting experience on some corpses first before seeking employment I would appreciate it.
Sincerely,
Jil W.
After thoughtful consideration, here’s what I sent back to the writer:
Jil:Thank you for your kind words about my website. And yes, I can tell you a little more about the job you’re seeking and why there’s not much on the internet about it.
First, I’ve never heard the phrase “corpse beautician” before. Frankly, it sounds in poor taste, which may be why no one uses the title.You would do better to talk to funeral homes about cosmetologist positions or ask about employments as a dressing room attendant.But the more likely reason that you can’t find job listings for the position is that few funeral homes employ someone who only does makeup. Most funeral homes know that putting makeup on the deceased is such a tiny percentage of the workday, making it a job done by the same person who embalms the body, dresses the deceased and puts them in the casket.In smaller funeral homes, that person might also empty the ashtrays on the smoking porch, vacuum the chapel, typeset the memorial folder, run the death certificate and stand for the visitation.In fact, some firms that handle 60-80 funerals a year (near the national average, actually) might only have two full-time employees. That means the licensed funeral director is doing all the preparation and the secretary/assistant does all the jobs the funeral director doesn’t want to do.What I’ve just described is analogous with my experience working in a small, family funeral home. However, you might be more interested in what I saw at the large corporate firm where I worked.There are several large corporations that own groups or “clusters” of funeral homes across the country. These clusters operate at their most efficient when they utilize a central prepartion facility to handle the embalming, dressing, cosmetizing and casketing of the deceased for several funeral home locations.In this arrangement, there are folks whose full-time jobs are to embalm and prepare the deceased. In the large central facility where I worked in the 1990′s, there was a person whose sole job was to dress and cosmetize the deceased clients.Before you get your hopes up, you should know what that job required:Lifiting 100 pounds or more (to lift bodies into caskets)Manipulating remains for dressing
Making a windsor knot in a tie on a person who’s lying down (harder than you’d think)
Dealing with purge (bodies that leak after embalming)Lifting, stacking, pushing heavy caskets
Any other thing the funeral directors ask you to doStill want this job?Seriously, if this is something that you’re interested in, you should call some funeral homes. But don’t be surprised if they don’t give you the warmest reception.When I worked in the funeral home, I could always tell when a beauty school had just graduated a class because I would get ten calls in a week from freshly-minted cosmetologists who thought they were the first ones ever to look for a job in a funeral home. And it was sad to have to tell them that my boss handled all the cosmetic work and was actually really good at it. Besides, how would they make a living coming in once or twice a week for an hour to makeup a few bodies?I hope I haven’t upset you terribly. I think you will be able to make better decisions about your future with the information I’ve offered.Once last bit of advice: don’t try to sell yourself as a “corpse beautician.” Sounds kinda creepy.TIM
December 3, 2009
Just read the blog post from Unnecessary Umlaut. It’s interesting and disturbing and, I’m sure, something that makes this funeral home memorable.
Spooky: Miniature Golf in Basement of Ahlgrim’s Funeral Home
