Corporate vs Family Funeral Home

Today 85-87% of funeral homes are independently owned. It can be tricky to run a small business locally, especially as many businesses are passed down from generation to generation, and not every generation being so eager to run the show. Take, for instance, the case of the crematorium that was passed down to a son who decided he'd rather toss the bodies in the backyard than upkeep the property and services, thus leading to a billion-dollar lawsuit involving over 2,000 corpses.

As horrifying as this may sound, it's certainly not representative of the vast majority of operations in the US. Most of the time, when people don't wish to carry on the legacy themselves, they farm their business out to a large corporation that is eager to cash-in on the $20-billion-a-year "death care" industry. This could mean a whole new world of service from your local, privately run funeral home.

The prices vary greatly from funeral home to funeral home, even on a local scale. Some of this traces back to ownership. Anthony Amigone, president of Amigone Funeral Homes says, ""By staying independently owned, we can keep our prices under control and we can maintain a very high standard of service." On the other hand, corporate-owned Service Corporation International insists that they have lowered their casket prices in an effort to make burials more cost efficient, versus cremations. However, one should be careful, as burials cost more in the long run. Price is just one of many changes in this industry.

Secondly, branding has become part of the corporate appeal. Twenty-four-hour "compassion hotline" services are marketed on television, some targeting Latino viewers or other specific demographics. They choose new names like "Dignity Memorial" or "Forever Remembered" to be marketed from coast to coast. Websites will become more elaborate and marketing techniques could begin to edge out the smaller competition. However, many argue that the appeal of the family-owned funeral parlor will never die because people generally associate higher levels of care and fairer prices from the independents.

Thirdly, big companies with big money can sometimes offer better musical arrangements, more funeral flowers and more elaborate memorials. Some directors can even offer videographers who will put together a multimedia presentation for guests at the wake or memorial. Another newer service being offered by funeral homes/laboratory partnerships is DNA storage, which can help with paternal tests, family genealogical history studying and disease screening. The price for this service is about $295 for DNA retrieval and 25 years of storage. These services are valuable to some, but could one day usurp all the little funeral homes that can't accommodate these extra, high tech goodies.

The Funeral Rule mandates that funeral homes provide a clear, updated list of services, options and prices. Funeral directors are not allowed to unethically push customers into anything they don't want or need. The internet also has a variety of caskets, urns, burial liners and products available for one's use at a burial plot or funeral home, with no extra fees involved, save for shipping.

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