My high school speech teacher, a favorite to many, known as “BC”, was dying. I met with BC and her brother to discuss possibilities for her service, listening as they recalled all the plays and student activities she had directed, and her many interests. I let my imagination run with ideas to celebrate her life. […] The post The Art of Imagineering a Unique Funeral Service appeared first on funeralOne Blog. The Art of Imagineering a Unique Funeral Service published first on YouTube via Tumblr The Art of Imagineering a Unique Funeral Service
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When I entered the funeral industry a few years back as a product manufacturer with an art education I took note of an odd question that funeral directors repeatedly asked me…
At first, I politely provided my suggestions and didn’t think much of it. Maybe funeral directors were particularly clumsy under the stress of their jobs and had dozens of broken coffee cups that they had knocked onto the floor in haste? After a while, I realized something strange was going on and with a tiny amount of questioning learned that funeral directors were gluing on the tops of ceramic urns at the request of the customers. Duh. The fragile nature of ceramic and insecure lids cause urns made of clay to be sparse in funeral home showrooms. Many customers, however, are in love with the natural feel of clay and dislike the cold and manufactured look of metal so they search for a way to have both aesthetic beauty and closure security. The solution? Adhesives! From a user experience and design standpoint, the lid-gluing situation is infuriating and an absolutely ridiculous problem that manufacturers should be addressing. To put this in perspective, imagine that when you purchased an iPhone for $399, the first thing you needed to do was glue the home button on. If we can buy a small supercomputer for the same price we are paying for a clay pot surely we can figure out a way to manufacture it with a secure lid. There is no other product in our lives that we buy and then imminently glue… that’s insane. That said, with a $90,000 education in ceramic art I know about some badass adhesives (finally, I get to put this degree to use) and I am going the share them with you… The 2 adhesives below where chosen considering over 10 years of trial-and-error ceramic-gluing experience. There was even a fiasco where I had a gorilla glue smeared on my hands for over a month while I tried tirelessly to peel it off. These are the best glues for sealing ceramic urns taking into consideration clean-up, material properties, cost, and availability. Both the following adhesives (or versions of them) are available at your local hardware store. I highly recommend having acetone on hand for super fast and precise clean up of accidental smears or drips on the product. 1. PC-7PC-7 is my go-to adhesive. It is incredibly strong and designed for permanent jobs, it cleans up easily with dish soap and water, and its thicker than peanut butter after it’s mixed making it simple to work with. This is a solid epoxy so it can be susceptible to cracking if the material moves or the object is dropped – but I have never had this problem. 2. Loctite Go2 GELSome people prefer silicon-based adhesives for their ability to flex slightly after curing. If an urn is kept in a garage or basement where air temperatures can fluctuate causing the material to expand and contract, flexible glues might be an appropriate solution. Loctite G02 GEL can move with the expansions and contractions where other more solid epoxies might crack. The downside to silicone and flex adhesives is that they are super sticky, clear, and seem to get everywhere every time. This definitely requires acetone for cleanup. Adhesives NOT to use:Avoid foaming adhesives like Gorilla Glue and Great Stuff. These adhesives foam after they are applied and you can end up with a very unappealing situation that looks like Slimer from Ghostbusters is trying to escape out the top of a closed urn…. except it’s someone’s grandmother. Awkward. What is your favorite urn-sealing adhesive? Let us know in the comments! The post Learn the 2 Best Adhesives to Seal Ceramic Urns FOREVER appeared first on Connecting Directors. Learn the 2 Best Adhesives to Seal Ceramic Urns FOREVER published first on YouTube via Tumblr Learn the 2 Best Adhesives to Seal Ceramic Urns FOREVER Phoenix, September 25, 2018: Today, Daniel M. Isard, president and founder of The Foresight Companies, North America’s premier financial and management consulting firm serving owners of funeral homes and cemeteries, announced that Doug Gober has joined his company as partner. “Doug Gober is a living icon of credibility within the funeral and cemetery professions. I am very excited about having him join with us as my partner,” Isard said. “Doug will carry on with his personal commitment to develop and provide, financial and management services that enable my company to promote the success of our clients,” Dan Isard stated. Doug has a Business Degree in Accounting, is a CPA and has over 39 years of experience in the funeral industry. He previously worked for Live Oak Bank as industry liaison and Senior Loan Officer before starting his own firm, Gober Strategic Capital. Prior to that he spent time with Carriage Services, Matthews International and York Group, as well as many years at the highly renowned design company The Doody Group. His first entre into funeral service was as a Batesville Casket Co. salesman. His education and life experiences make him a perfect addition to Foresight’s leadership team. Doug adds, “For nearly 30 years I have had the privilege of encountering Dan and his team at funeral service functions. We have shared the stage many times where one of us would follow the other. When we finally started to explore the possibility of combining our companies, it became clear that The Foresight Companies and my work are a perfect match in both philosophy and expertise. I approach this new opportunity with a heightened sense of enthusiasm about serving and supporting those who serve. There has never been a better time to be in funeral service than right now.” Doug’s role will essentially be the same as the role of his partner, Dan Isard. He will provide clients with holistic financial and management consulting while working to lead the Foresight team into the future. No two people have been more accepted at addressing audiences within these professions as Dan and Doug. Foresight’s planning for 2019 will feature Dan, Doug, Director of Marketing, Jeff Harbeson as well as Director of HR, Stephanie Ramsey, in a variety of seminars throughout the US. “Doug’s experience with small family funeral homes and his high level of energy bring professionalism to the ownership team that Foresight needs to continue growing and meeting our client’s business needs into the next generation.” he said. Last year an independent survey on the most trusted financial people in funeral service concluded that Dan Isard was number 1 and Doug Gober was number 2. This result drove Dan and Doug to find the means to collaborate, which resulted in this partnership. Since its founding in the mid-1980s, Foresight has marketed itself throughout the death care professions serving more than 3,000 funeral homes and almost 1,000 cemeteries. Foresight provides financial and management consulting services including valuations, accounting, family transition strategies, strategic planning, merger, acquisition, HR services, surveys and helps secure financing. The Foresight team also participates in a mix of national public speaking engagements and seminars, and produces industry published articles, webinars, videos and multimedia blogs. You can reach Doug to congratulate him by calling The Foresight Companies at 800-426-0165 or emailing [email protected]. For additional information or interview requests please contact Catherine Belliveau at 800-426-0165 or visit our website at: www.theforesightcompanies.com The post Doug Gober Joins The Foresight Companies, LLC as Partner appeared first on Connecting Directors. Doug Gober Joins The Foresight Companies, LLC as Partner published first on YouTube via Tumblr Doug Gober Joins The Foresight Companies, LLC as Partner The National Society of Allied and Independent Funeral Directors has today issued a press release stating its position on the subject of regulation. SAIF members received an e-mail yesterday advising them that ‘after careful consideration we have decided that regulation across England and Wales is a good thing and welcome it’. The ‘careful consideration’ appears to have been carried out by the SAIF executive committee. SAIF members were not consulted before the statement was announced and the consultation is apparently to follow. Now, while it’s quite possible that all of the more than 870 members of SAIF and additional 100 associate members will all unanimously agree that regulation of some kind is required in the funeral industry, if we were a member of an association that was representing our business (we’re not by the way) we’d rather like to have been asked first about our opinion on such an important subject. At the GFG we have long taken a stance that regulation of the funeral industry needs to be carefully considered and crafted, and definitely not determined by the trade associations involved. Trade associations are exactly what the name implies. Any decision on regulation should be led by the interests of the bereaved person, a consumer focus that trade associations are, by definition the exact opposite to. Trade associations represent the interests of their members. Full stop. Regulation of the funeral industry needs to be informed by wide input, including the funeral world, ideally by seeking the views of every person or company involved with providing assistance of some kind with funerals. However, currently, nobody knows exactly how many funeral director companies are currently operating, whereabouts they are or who is running them. There is no central register of any kind. At the same time, the UK government is currently paralysed in every area other than those directly involved with the imminent withdrawal from the EU. Attempting to introduce regulation of the funeral industry in the current climate would, we gently suggest, likely mean that government would hand over the critical work of framing the regulation to the funeral industry trade associations hovering helpfully in the wings with their suggestions. Incidentally, for ‘regulation’, replace with ‘whole tranches of licensing, required training, standards of premises, membership of associations’ and so forth, all providing new layers of bureaucracy, all coming at a cost (to be passed on to whom?), all adding to the end result of – what? More passionate, creative, intelligent people starting up small companies to serve bereaved families in the best possible way? We doubt it. Read the press release from SAIF below. Independent funeral directors call for regulation of profession in England, Wales and Northern Ireland England, Wales and Northern Ireland should follow in Scotland’s footsteps and introduce regulation of the funeral profession. This is the position of the National Society of Allied and Independent Funeral Directors (SAIF) – the voice of independent, family-owned funeral directors across the UK. It makes SAIF the first significant funeral trade association in the UK to back statutory regulation of funeral directors. The association has also urged its members with websites to display their prices online as soon as possible to help bereaved consumers better understand possible costs involved with a funeral. It could also mean families get a better deal, with research consistently showing that independent funeral directors’ prices are consistently lower than large groups, like Co-op Funeralcare, Dignity and Funeral Partners. SAIF’s position on regulation is in response to the positive and proportionate way in which regulation is being introduced in Scotland, and comes in the wake of a small number of worrying cases in which funeral directors have fallen short of standards to which trade association members subscribe. Terry Tennens, Chief Executive of SAIF, said it was high time all bereaved people across the UK were guaranteed a minimum set of standards from the professionals taking care of them at life’s most difficult time. “Currently, anyone can set up a funeral directing business and there is no requirement for them to work to a minimum set of standards. Trade associations require their members to abide by a code of practice, but membership is voluntary and we are seeing too many cases of firms who don’t belong to an association operating in an unacceptable way,” Terry said. He added: “All other care industries are regulated, so there is no reason why funeral directors to whom people turn in great distress should not be subjected to similar rules. The vast majority of SAIF members share concerns about standards and support regulation of the funeral profession.” In respect of online pricing, Terry said SAIF’s leadership was set to discuss a commonly agreed set of funeral elements that would appear on a price list, to better help consumers make like-for-like comparisons. A price list should also include options for a simple or basic funeral and a traditional funeral, along with additional items such as flowers and orders of service. This could eventually form part of the association’s code of practice. Despite concerns about poor practice, bereaved people should be reassured that the overwhelming majority of independent funeral directors operate to high standards. However, one firm operating below par is one too many. Regulation of the funeral profession should be proportionate and informed by all stakeholders, with the views of independent funeral directors carrying as much weight in any process as those of the large corporates and cooperatives. SAIF’s call for UK-wide regulation of the funeral profession comes ahead of the findings of a Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) study of the funeral market. A proportionate regulatory regime could address some of the transparency issues being examined by the CMA and ensure clients of all funeral directors are getting a good deal. SAIF is to consult its members and the wider funeral profession on areas of focus for any possible regulatory regime which are likely to include:
Following a consultation exercise, SAIF is to write to the Westminster Government, Welsh and Northern Ireland assemblies, stating its position on regulation of the funeral profession across all jurisdictions. Funeral trade association calls for regulation published first on YouTube via Tumblr Funeral trade association calls for regulation Passages International founded by Darren Crouch has paved an unexpected environmentally-conscious path in the change-averse funeral industry. The company began almost 20 years ago, in 1999, before the term “Global Warming” was popularized and before concerns of climate change sparked a national movement. The Green Movement catalyzed in 2007 after “Step It Up,” the largest grassroots environmental demonstration in recent history in which 1,400 communities and all 50 states protested for real global warming solutions. Passages was 10 years ahead of an international green movement presenting memorial products with minimal environmental impact at affordable prices. Passages traversed an unexpected path to arrive at the where they are today – the industry leader in environmentally conscious funeral merchandise. Finding Inspiration in The Black BoxCrouch was working in the luxury hotel industry in California and looking for a career change when he recognized an opportunity in the cremation merchandise space. His wife’s family was in the funeral business and his brother-in-law shared that he was starting to see a change in the values of his consumers.
One particular experience that resonated with Crouch was the temporary cremation container commonly referred to as the “black box.” The “black box” is an instantly recognizable container in the funeral space that has grown to become a bitter icon of the challenges that cremation has presented for the industry. Crouch’s conversations with his brother-in-law launched him on a mission to improve cremation containers for customers worldwide.
Crouch set out to design a better solution. His goal was to introduce a temporary cremation container that was…actually temporary. He wanted his product to be dignified, yet affordable for families; something that they would see value in, but would also be profitable for the funeral home. It was crucial that the product was impermanent and facilitated the popular ritual of scattering ashes.
Birth of the Earthurn®Earthurn® became the design that would fill a gap in the funeral-customer experience while increasing revenue for funeral homes. Crouch launched his unprecedented impermanent cremation containers with a national ad campaign in funeral trade publications, by writing articles, and by exhibiting at conventions. Crouch’s very first exhibition was NFDA in Kansas City in October of 1999 where he realized there was nothing like Earthurn® available. As soon as Crouch introduced the original four Earthurn® designs he realized that funeral directors started to market them as biodegradable urns. He observed how his funeral home partners were talking about them and connected the language to an emerging national trend that would shape his brand.
Passages International TodayToday, Passages International has an extensive product line which includes a variety of materials and styles of biodegradable urns like salt, sand, and gourds as well as environmentally-friendly wicker caskets. Their products are offered in tens of thousands of funeral homes around the globe and in 2017 alone they sold nearly 100,000 eco-friendly products – They are on track to pass that sales volume for 2018. Passages has ridden the green wave of environmental consciousness for twenty years and it hasn’t even crested yet…
Passages has just completed a massive expansion of their production and distribution facility in Albuquerque, NM (from 9,000 sq. ft. to almost 30,000 sq. ft.) and increased staff to position the company for exponential growth in the coming years. When asked what he sees for the future of Passages International and green funeral practices Crouch said,
You can see all of Passages International’s Products online or find Darren Crouch and his team at NFDA 2018 in Salt Lake City. The post Learn How Passages International Paved an Unexpected Green Path in Funeral Care appeared first on Connecting Directors. Learn How Passages International Paved an Unexpected Green Path in Funeral Care published first on YouTube via Tumblr Learn How Passages International Paved an Unexpected Green Path in Funeral Care **Disclaimer*** This is the real process we use and have proven with hundreds of funeral homes. In episode 51, I showed you how to classify what a true Facebook lead looks like (https://youtu.be/Ncik3jSZwl0). Now, I breakdown the EXACT BLUEPRINT for finding that lead (targeted consumer), how to use content in the middle part of the funnel to work the user into the lower third of the funnel and then how to use Facebook ads to make the transaction (lead) happen. —————————————————-- Ryan Thogmartin is a death care entrepreneur and the CEO of DISRUPT Media and creator of ConnectingDirectors.com. | Follower of Christ | Husband | Father | Entrepreneur | Host of #DISRUPTu! and #FUNERALnationtv | Lover of Skittles About DISRUPT Media: Most deathcare companies struggle with Facebook marketing. We provide a process for creating personalized Facebook content that will drive community engagement and measurable leads ensuring growth and profitability. Schedule a demo: http://www.disruptmedia.co The post The Easy Blueprint for Finding Your Most Profitable Consumer on Facebook | DISRUPTu! 053 appeared first on Connecting Directors. The Easy Blueprint for Finding Your Most Profitable Consumer on Facebook | DISRUPTu! 053 published first on YouTube via Tumblr The Easy Blueprint for Finding Your Most Profitable Consumer on Facebook | DISRUPTu! 053 Six Flags St. Louis in Eureka, MO, is celebrating its 30th year of Fright Fest with a death-related contest that funeral directors might be uniquely qualified to win. On October 13th they will commence a “coffin challenge” in which they ask participants to spend 30 hours in a “slightly used” deluxe coffin where they will have a 2-foot by 7-foot space to spend a little more than a full day of their lives. Time well-spent. The participants will be subjected to a variety of tactics to scare them out of their little space. They will be periodically visited by Fright Fest Freaks and be required to spend the nights (when the park is closed) in their coffins completely alone. There are a few perks as well including the friend that gets to hang out with you during open-hours, the bathroom breaks every 6 hours, and the essential cell phone charging cable installed in the coffin. If you can make it 30 hours without leaving the coffin your nerves of steel are rewarded with some compelling prizes. You will receive two 2019 Gold Season Passes and a Fright Fest Prize Package with tickets to the haunted house and Freak Train. Additionally, one lucky winner will receive $300 cash. But perhaps the real prize is that each successful contestant gets to keep their coffin! Maybe next year they will see how long you can spend in a cremation chamber. I mean, who is still getting buried these days anyway? The post Theme Park Launches Coffin Contest to Celebrate 30-years of Mortal Fear appeared first on Connecting Directors. Theme Park Launches Coffin Contest to Celebrate 30-years of Mortal Fear published first on YouTube via Tumblr Theme Park Launches Coffin Contest to Celebrate 30-years of Mortal Fear This is a HUGE conversation that must happen! Jeff and Ryan discuss a new report that says funeral regulations are costing consumers Billions of dollars in unneeded fees. What do you think, is the funeral profession over regulated? The post Are Funeral Regulations Costing Consumers Additional Money? | FUNERAL Nation 124 appeared first on Connecting Directors. Are Funeral Regulations Costing Consumers Additional Money? | FUNERAL Nation 124 published first on YouTube via Tumblr Are Funeral Regulations Costing Consumers Additional Money? | FUNERAL Nation 124 Kelco Supply Company Will Be Part of The Worlds Greatest! Television Series On September 24 20189/24/2018 Kelco Supply Company announced today that they have recently been selected to be part of the popular television series “World’s Greatest!…” produced by How2Media of Boynton Beach, FL. “World’s Greatest!…” is a thirty minute show dedicated to highlighting the world’s greatest companies, products, places, and people. Each show is a fast paced tour around the world featuring behind the scenes footage, informative interviews, and exciting visuals. As part of the show, How2Media sent a film crew to spend time at the company’s facilities in Big Lake, Minnesota, just Northwest of Minneapolis, to find out what the story behind the story is about with Kelco Supply Company, and to show the “World’s Greatest!…” viewers why they were selected as the best in their category, and therefore featured on the show. Watch for their upcoming episode to air on September 24, 2018. More information on Kelco’s website and Facebook page will be posted soon. For information about where to watch episode 262 of World’s Greatest, please search – https://worldsgreatesttelevision.com/tv_schedule/ Kelco Supply company is a cremation and funeral supply company that has been providing quality products to funeral professionals since 1939. “Staying true to our commitment of being there for our clients, we never stop searching for the perfect additions to our already exceptional product offering. Our motto is “Like you’re there for your families, we’re there for you”, and we live by this by offering unique and meaningful items at all price points” said Alicia Carr, CEO for Kelco Supply Company. How2Media is a 21st Century television production company. Their award winning programming can be seen on national cable channels and local network affiliates across the country. For more information on How2Media and their show lineup, please visit How2Media.tv. The post Kelco Supply Company Will Be Part of The “Worlds’ Greatest!…” Television Series On September 24, 2018 appeared first on Connecting Directors. Kelco Supply Company Will Be Part of The “Worlds’ Greatest!…” Television Series On September 24, 2018 published first on YouTube via Tumblr Kelco Supply Company Will Be Part of The “Worlds’ Greatest!…” Television Series On September 24, 2018 When I entered the funeral industry a few years back as a product manufacturer with an art education I took note of an odd question that funeral directors repeatedly asked me…
At first, I politely provided my suggestions and didn’t think much of it. Maybe funeral directors were particularly clumsy under the stress of their jobs and had dozens of broken coffee cups that they had knocked onto the floor in haste? After a while, I realized something strange was going on and with a tiny amount of questioning learned that funeral directors were gluing on the tops of ceramic urns at the request of the customers. Duh. The fragile nature of ceramic and insecure lids cause urns made of clay to be sparse in funeral home showrooms. Many customers, however, are in love with the natural feel of clay and dislike the cold and manufactured look of metal so they search for a way to have both aesthetic beauty and closure security. The solution? Adhesives! From a user experience and design standpoint, the lid-gluing situation is infuriating and an absolutely ridiculous problem that manufacturers should be addressing. To put this in perspective, imagine that when you purchased an iPhone for $399, the first thing you needed to do was glue the home button on. If we can buy a small supercomputer for the same price we are paying for a clay pot surely we can figure out a way to manufacture it with a secure lid. There is no other product in our lives that we buy and then imminently glue… that’s insane. That said, with a $90,000 education in ceramic art I know about some badass adhesives (finally, I get to put this degree to use) and I am going the share them with you… The 2 adhesives below where chosen considering over 10 years of trial-and-error ceramic-gluing experience. There was even a fiasco where I had a gorilla glue smeared on my hands for over a month while I tried tirelessly to peel it off. These are the best glues for sealing ceramic urns taking into consideration clean-up, material properties, cost, and availability. Both the following adhesives (or versions of them) are available at your local hardware store. I highly recommend having acetone on hand for super fast and precise clean up of accidental smears or drips on the product. 1. PC-7PC-7 is my go-to adhesive. It is incredibly strong and designed for permanent jobs, it cleans up easily with dish soap and water, and its thicker than peanut butter after it’s mixed making it simple to work with. This is a solid epoxy so it can be susceptible to cracking if the material moves or the object is dropped – but I have never had this problem. 2. Loctite Go2 GELSome people prefer silicon-based adhesives for their ability to flex slightly after curing. If an urn is kept in a garage or basement where air temperatures can fluctuate causing the material to expand and contract, flexible glues might be an appropriate solution. Loctite G02 GEL can move with the expansions and contractions where other more solid epoxies might crack. The downside to silicone and flex adhesives is that they are super sticky, clear, and seem to get everywhere every time. This definitely requires acetone for cleanup. Adhesives NOT to use:Avoid foaming adhesives like Gorilla Glue and Great Stuff. These adhesives foam after they are applied and you can end up with a very unappealing situation that looks like Slimer from Ghostbusters is trying to escape out the top of a closed urn…. except it’s someone’s grandmother. Awkward. What is your favorite urn-sealing adhesive? Let us know in the comments! The post Learn the 2 Best Adhesives to Seal Ceramic Urns FOREVER appeared first on Connecting Directors. Learn the 2 Best Adhesives to Seal Ceramic Urns FOREVER published first on YouTube via Tumblr Learn the 2 Best Adhesives to Seal Ceramic Urns FOREVER |
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