I love flowers – especially at funerals. When families tell me they want to use “in lieu of flowers” in the obituary for a loved one, I do my level best to explain just how valuable sympathy flowers are to the funeral experience. The giving and receiving of sympathy flowers during times of mourning, sadness […]
Being in the funeral business, I have the tendency to remember exactly where I was when influential people pass away, down to every detail. I remember 1997 really well. It was the year that Princess Diana died. I got myself out of bed at 4:00 am to watch her funeral, and cried at the loss […]
A few years ago, a longtime friend of mine passed away, and I was asked to write his obituary. Taking the time to reflect on the life of this quirky, rebellious, anti-income tax activist (and tax consultant!) was a powerful experience. It felt good, and I was pleased with the end result. But then we […]
Einstein said it best, “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.” Taking on the role of a leader in your funeral firm means that you open yourself up to making a few mistakes – and hopefully – learning from them along the way. Demonstrating leadership within your funeral home is […]
We all know there are limits to what you as a funeral home owner or operator, can do to promote your firm. Or are there? Perhaps we’re just crippled by our own myopic thinking. And considering how tough things are out there, we just can’t afford to be nearsighted. Here’s what I’ve learned from some […]
Today, many Americans will celebrate Armed Forces Day. Set aside back in 1949, the day gives us all the opportunity to pay special tribute to the men and women of the Armed Forces. There are parades, open houses on military bases around the country, receptions and air shows. Just like last year, the President Obama […]
You’ve probably heard all the statistics about the exploding, exponential growth of social media. Like this one. There are more than 800 million Facebook users, and if Facebook was a country, it would be the third largest in the world behind China and India. HubSpot tells us that that 93% of all Internet users in […]
We all know what the Funeral Rule declares: you must offer your General Price List when you begin to discuss the type of funeral or disposition that you can arrange, the specific goods and services that you offer; or the prices of your goods and services. But what does that mean when your first interaction […]
Bear with me for a minute, will you? Dust off your imagination, and picture this: your merchant ship, the Compassionate, is caught in rough seas. Your crew members are working as hard as they can to regain control of the ship, but they’re tiring. Now, you find a pirate vessel is outflanking you, and everyone […]
It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power. – Alan Cohen I think […]
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