Baby Boom or Bust; the Last Stand of Funeral Service

I have just finished reading a very interesting article about where the future of the funeral industry is headed. Please read and post your thoughts. -- Matt Frazer, President at Frazer Consultants



Baby Boom or Bust; the Last Stand of Funeral Service
By Karl E. Jennings, CEO
Healing Farewell Center of America & Borek Jennings Funeral Homes

What could modern funeral service in 2011 and a battle fought at the Alamo 175 years ago possibly have in common? Frankly, not much, except for the facts that for both there came a time when a line had to be drawn, commitments had to be made and destinies were forever forged.

On March 6, 1836, Colonel William B. Travis and his soldiers were faced with a crushing number of Mexican soldiers led by General Santa Anna. The odds were overwhelmingly against them. As hope was quickly fading; Colonel Travis called his soldiers together and then drew a line in the dirt. He then asked any man willing to stay and fight to step across the line and join him on the other side … only one declined.

Colonel Travis required those committing to move forward. Why didn't he simply ask those unwilling to fight to step back? Remember these words from Dale Carnegie, "Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.” Colonial Travis and the soldiers at the Alamo knew what they believed in and were willing to pay the ultimate price to defend it.

As with the overwhelming forces closing in on Colonel Travis, so to the funeral industry has slowly been surrounded by forces, both scattered and organized, that are eroding the necessity and relevancy of our profession. The time has come for funeral directors to draw a line in the dirt, take a hard look in the mirror and choose what hill they are willing to die on. If you don't choose, it likely will be chosen for you. In the next 10 years even the gains made by the emerging baby boomer market won't be enough to keep us professionally relevant or financially viable.

Our industry has been in a passive and seemingly defenseless position as we've faced a relentless pounding of negative media for almost 40 years. In response to this, many in our industry seem to be hostile and, at a minimum, detached from clients who more and more frequently reject their current service/merchandise offerings. While some are attempting to respond to this development by expanding their services to include catering and pet disposition services; most are still just attempting to survive. For both, I pose two questions:

1. Do you really think families would reject your services if they believed you could actually help them?


2. Do you really think families believe buying any kind of merchandise item -- casket, urn, vault or keepsake -- will help them begin healing? 

Given the way the vast majority of funeral homes present their services and merchandise, it shouldn't be surprising that their clients don't see the value. This disconnect was institutionalized by the FTC Rule. Nowhere in the FTC requirements will you find anything that mentions what benefit clients receive for what they pay. The fundamental question the modern consumer asks when spending their money is, “What's in it for me?” It is the failure to connect our services and merchandise fees with a value or benefit to the purchaser that has our profession on the brink.

If you really believe the funeral is for the living, what are you doing for the living besides being kind, compassionate and caring? Today, you don't get much credit for being kind and very often it barely earns you a seat at the table. Candidly, the more I step back and view our industry from the outside, the more I realize how insulated we've become; surrendering our profession to indifference, cynics, fads and fluff.

This was never more obvious to me than when I attended a convention, for the first time in 20 years, and was saddened to find that so little had changed. To no surprise, I found row after row of casket, vault, urn and monument companies desperately trying to put new lipstick on an old pig. The fads and fluff were different 20 years ago … but no less out of touch. No matter how you personalize metal, wood, granite or plastic, it is a commodity that cannot guide the wounded, educate the lost, support the needy and empower the helpless. Remember this, if a casket-vault-cremation merchandise supplier is your primary source of innovation and marketing, you've surrendered your professional identity to someone who is selling to you … not your customer. How has that worked for you over the past 25 years?

The dominance of the retail-based approach to providing products to our clients is what has led them to conclude that we have betrayed their best interest. Some of you may be put off by the word betrayal. The betrayal of a client occurs if you act in a way that you know you shouldn't, or you don't act in a way that you know you should; whether you act intentionally or not. Ask yourself: At the most difficult moment of your life, would you really want to sit across from someone who has disguised a good, better and best merchandising approach beneath the veneer of compassionate care for your most emotionally vulnerable needs?

Our clients think merchandise offerings of all kinds are a necessary evil. I thought this back in mortuary school 30 years ago and still believe it today. Every time you sell something other than experiences that will help your family heal, they think you are a salesperson they must protect themselves from, not a professional that they can trust.

If this is the hill you've chosen to die on, the bugler will shortly be playing taps.


A Three Fold Initiative to Transform the Funeral Industry

I. Establish a new Body of Knowledge, Professional Language and Universal Narrative
A new body of knowledge must be established that encompasses the ten-day period following a death. We call this the Acute Loss Period and apply an intentional plan using our Acute Loss Management System to educate and deliver value to every family. The acute loss period begins the first moment we hear the news that someone has died and continues to the beginning of a healthy grief experience. There are essential steps each family must go through to begin a healthy grief cycle. Healing language is therapeutic, interactive and educational and provides the client with a clear answer to their most poignant needs at the time of loss.

This new language describes experiences that overtly help families attend to their emotional, relational and spiritual needs regardless of the type of disposition a family chooses. In this model we are no longer funeral directors, but guides and teachers of the Acute Loss Period. We join the healing professions and have an intentional plan to provide palliative care to the surviving in the days immediately following loss. Those who embrace the idea of healing must educate themselves on the Acute Loss Period and the language of healing. Those who have mastered the knowledge and language must transform their service offerings to include healing support services that aid every generation of the bereaved.

We all know that we don't have funerals for the dead. We have funerals to help the living begin healing. Knowing this is true and having an intentional plan to teach, guide and consistently deliver these experiences enables the client to see “the invisible” value of what we can do to help them. Today's client wants to know what's in it for them. During the arrangement process the presentation of the healing narrative must drip with truth, integrity and authenticity. It must provide a map of the experience of loss that enables the client to foresee things they haven't considered, and be empowered as a collaborative partner in caring for their family. It is the only way to gain a hearing from a skeptical audience, establish expertise and recapture the confidence of today's consumer.

The human experience with loss is one of the most profound experiences any human being will have. Although, we won't be in this position forever, as of right now, only funeral directors are in a position to provide the education, guidance and support most families need during the first ten days following a loss. Failure to assume these roles reduces the funeral director to a data-taker, logistics planner, merchandise retailer, options presenter and compassionate provider of remains processing. These roles are not the generous neutral activity of a professional, but the detached minimalist behavior of the inadequate.

I've heard the voices of countless kind, caring and committed funeral directors bemoaning my assessment of their arrangement styles and responsibilities. I would advise each to be careful not to confuse your personal traits with the ability to educate, guide and support a family with an intentional plan to nurture their healing. One of the biggest obstacles to achieving a universal language and narrative is that so many are willing to be rejected professionally as long as the family appears to like and/or appreciate them personally. Imagine the oncologist who sought personal acceptance over professional relevance. Would it lead her to tell her patients that they could choose or make up any cure they wanted for the cancer that was killing them? If she did this, her patients may love her for the moment, but not much longer than that.

II. Educate: Defending the Healing Narrative
After five years of working with funeral homes from one side of the country to the other. There is one problem that is universal and was best expressed by a receptionist at a funeral home we work with. She stated, “I get so frustrated, because I see the value of what we do every day, but don't know how to explain it to someone else.”

Sadly, it's approaching 50 years since Jessica Mitford fired a shot into the hull of our industry's ship, and we still are stalled in harbor; analyzing damage and unable to offer a coherent rebuttal. We've been taking on water as one NFDA president after another, one mortuary school after another, one convention after another, and one receptionist after another, continues to accurately identify the problem, but fails to offer solutions.

The Healing narrative involves a thorough understanding of the emotional, relational and spiritual needs and experiences of those who have suffered loss and the seven phases of the Acute Loss Period. We must offer, as part of our Basic Services, experiences that present a therapeutic, interactive and educational value to each generation of the families we are privileged to serve.

The Healing narrative and language will provide the industry with a universal message and rebuttal that is necessary to establish educational talking points. These talking points can be formatted into every form of media available in individual markets. Additionally, each funeral home must execute a deep grass roots educational campaign that spans three years and touches every organization in communities that have funeral homes. Our numbers, position and influence still allow us the opportunity to aggressively re-educate our clients before the baby-boom market emerges. Make no mistake -- this is the line that is drawn in the dirt -- for the funeral business it will be baby boom or bust.

III. Execute: Delivering the Healing Narrative
Providing experiences and support services that nurture the human experience during the Acute Loss Period and attending to the emotional, relational and spiritual needs of the surviving are the delivery components of the Acute Loss Management System. The death of a loved one is a life-changing experience. We don't have to create the opportunity, it is being handed to us to nurture. To do this we have an intentional plan to help the surviving to begin healing during this life-changing experience; this is the last and best chance for funeral service to evolve. Do not mistake this for grief counseling. That is still an essential service following the Acute Loss Period.

We must teach each family that funerals help to begin a healthy grieving experience for the living. The family planner(s) must learn the seven essential phases their family must successfully navigate to nurture their emotional, relational and spiritual needs. This presentation will help the client recognize that successful navigation of these phases requires a plan for every generation in their family. Additionally, every funeral home should have a plan that assists a family in navigating the Acute Loss Period regardless of disposition.

Good education-based questions will help the family determine that this is a process they cannot avoid. The family must consider how their choices will engage their extended family and friends. The family needs to consider what support they will provide for children and have, thereunto, interactive activities for each generation in their family. The plan should explain to the family that failure to have a plan to deal with the emotional, relational and spiritual needs of the surviving may cause unresolved grief. When complete, the plan needs to become the new definition of Basic Services of funeral director and staff. If this body of knowledge and points of engagement, education and execution become the mainstay of dialogue of every funeral director and staff person, we could transform the view of funeral services within 10 years.

Retraining an industry to help a family understand and assess their emotional, relational and spiritual needs, without sounding like or attaching merchandise sales to the presentation, is the most obvious and intimidating path forward. The Healing Farewell Center of America has made it our mission to bring healing farewells to one family, one funeral home and one community at a time. We have the body of knowledge, the professional language and healing narrative to transform our industry. We ask you to consider joining our cause. Make no mistake, it is also our Alamo moment. The line is drawn, become part of the healing professions or perish. Cross the line, you will enter the battle. There still is time. Fail to cross and you have surrendered already.