family funeral directors

Unmasking the wolves

10 November 2010
Charles
14 Comments
Categories: Co-operative Funeralcare, Dignity, family funeral directors, funeral cost, funeral directors, SAIF

Over in the US, Service Corporation International (SCI) the multinational deathcare conglomerate which, here in the UK, begat Dignity, is in hot water. Again. One of its funeral homes, trading under the name of Stanetsky Memorial Chapels, mixed up two bodies. When they realised what they’d done, it seems that they illegally exhumed the one they’d already buried (it had enjoyed a good Jewish funeral first), and reburied it in the right place. Read the story here.

Were we to generalise from this in the light of our experience in Britain we might easily reach the conclusion that big chains of funeral directors are especially susceptible to Wrong Body Syndrome. Not all, mind. I’ve never heard of our Dignity making that mistake.

Yet I think we might agree, nonetheless, that even when they don’t make egregious mistakes, big chains are systemically incapable of giving the grieving public what they want. They know this, of course. It’s why they trade under the names of the families they’ve bought up. It’s the vital point the financial journalists always miss when writing about the trading position of Dignity, talking up the attractiveness of its shares. The market, they say, as if it were an unravished bride, is ripe for consolidation. Orthodox economics teaches us that consolidation’s what’s best for markets. But funeral consumers want small, intimate, private and personal. They want boutique. If they can have that at a lower price than the big beasts charge, they who enjoy economies of scale which they do not then pass on to consumers, it’s win-win for consumers all the way. Dignity shareholders urgently need to know this.

Again over in the US, “At least seven funeral homes say Robert Christiansen, director of Christiansen Funeral Home in Greenville and a cremation service in Wyoming, engaged in “cybersquatting” by registering variations of their Internet sites.” He then had all traffic to these sites redirected to him. Darkly devious. Read it all here.

If we are to generalise from this, those of us who know the funeral industry would probably agree that over here in the UK we, too, are aware of some pretty dark arts in the matter of marketing. And I use two examples of US malpractice simply to show that there’s nothing peculiarly British about the British way of undertaking.

Let’s come home, now, focus on the matter of transparency of ownership and celebrate the victory on 22 September 2010 of Daniel Robinson and Sons over LM Funerals trading in Epping as DC Poulton and Sons. Daniel Robinson complained to the Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) about three press ads:

The first press ad stated “SERVING THE LOCAL COMMUNITY SINCE 1888 … DC Poulton & Sons is one of the area’s longest established funeral directors, proudly serving the community for over 120 years”. The ad also featured an image of Howard Poulton.

The second press ad stated “Serving the local community since 1888 … DC Poulton & Sons is one of the area’s longest established funeral directors, proudly serving the community for over 120 years!”.

The third press ad also featured an image of Howard Poulton and stated “The Original and Traditional Funeral Directors Caring for families since 1888 …With over 70 years combined experience, Mr Howard Poulton, his Funeral Director Peter Wright and their team of funeral professionals are available to assist you”.

Daniel Robinson & Sons Ltd challenged whether:

1. the claims “Serving the local community since 1888” in ads (a) and (b), and the claim “The Original and Traditional Funeral Directors Caring for families since 1888” in ad (c) were misleading because they understood that the company that owned Poulton & Sons was established in 2003; and

2. the image of Howard Poulton gave the misleading impression that the business was still family run because they believed that Howard Poulton had retired.

The ASA upheld 1 (above). “The ASA noted that the certificate sent by DC Poulton showed they had provided services to the residents of Epping since 1890, but noted it did not state the type of services being offered. We considered, therefore, that it did not constitute evidence to demonstrate that they had been in business as funeral directors since 1888 as claimed. We also noted that the company had been acquired by LM Funerals in 1997 and that they had continued to operate under the name DC Poulton since that time. We considered that the claims “DC Poulton & Sons is one of the areas longest established funeral directors” and “The Original and Traditional Funeral Directors Caring for families since 1888” implied that the company was still owned by the Poulton family, that ownership was “original” and unchanged, which was not the case. In the absence of a prominent statement making clear that the business was owned by LM Funerals, we concluded that the ads were likely to mislead.”

The ASA did not uphold 2 (above): “We noted that Howard Poulton was still employed by DC Poulton and involved in the business and had not retired. We therefore concluded that the ads were not misleading.”

The ASA directed: The ads must not appear again in their current form. [Source]

For all that, DC Poulton continues to make this claim on its website: “D. C. Poulton & Sons was founded in 1888 as a builders and undertakers”.

Transparency of ownership is a hugely sensitive issue in the funeral industry. Independents rage about it, the big beasts chuckle at their impotence, and all the while funeral consumers are, basically, conned. They find out too late, if at all.

Some local authorities, bless them, try to warn consumers with this no-holds-barred text on their websites: “There has been a decline in recent years of the local family operated funeral director. Few people notice that large firms now own many family funeral directors throughout the country. The new owners may not be disclosed on shop signs or Letterheads. These firms may continue trading upon the inference of the caring qualities and local connection of the old family firm. Similarly, older people tend to reflect upon the past socialist principles of the “Co-op” funeral services, which may no longer apply.” [Source] I especially approve of the way they consign the Co-op’s socialist principles to history.

On 14 August 2008 Birmingham Trading Standards officer Derek Hoskins, in a letter to SAIF, detailed the laws concerning transparency of ownership:

“from 26th May 2008, the true ownership of a business must be conveyed to a consumer before he makes a transactional decision. I.e. if a company is trading as “I’M A SOLE TRADER FUNERALS LTD.”, is owned by “NATIONAL FUNERALS UK LTD”. The customer has the right to know whom they are really dealing with BEFORE they make their choice.” [Full text here]

It’s only fair and right that they should, of course. But is the law working as Mr Hoskins thinks it ought? No. The wolves continue to parade themselves in sheep’s clothing.

How do the big funeral chains get away with camouflaging themselves as they do? I hope a reader with a good legal brain will enlighten us.

At the same time, I very much hope that the ASA judgement above will renew the determination of independent funeral directors to look very closely at the ads of their wolf competitors and take them on with renewed zeal. You don’t just owe this yourselves, you owe it to consumers, too.

And should you need any more impetus to do that, consider this: Marks and Spencer are thinking about entering the market. Read and despair here.

Indy undertakers on the counter-attack

12 October 2010
Charles
8 Comments
Categories: Co-operative Funeralcare, Dignity, family funeral directors, funeral cost, funeral directors, Plan your own funeral, pre-need plans, SAIF

Saif’s  IPSOS-Mori price comparison survey published in February 2010 was dynamite. It showed that independents are generally cheaper than two big beasts of the industry, Co-operative Funeralcare and Dignity. Had Saif got the message out to the funeral-buying public it would have hit the big beasts’ bottom line bigtime.

But the message never got out, not in a big way – an eyebrow-raising non-occurrence considering the price obsession of British funeral consumers. Saif didn’t bang the drum and blow the trumpet. A number of its members are cross about this. All that money to create a weapon of mass destruction only for it to hastily hidden under a bushel. What a waste, they said.

Is Saif dumb or did it have its tongue cut out? The story cannot be told for fear of litigation. There was a rumour swirling that one of the big beasts put pressure on Saif’s suppliers to take sides: either you ditch your indies or we’ll ditch you. I don’t think we can attach any credence to that.

The advance of the clunking conglomerates has been inexorable. They have circumvented the nobody-does-it-better claim of the independents and fought the war instead on the unpropitious battleground of financial planning, employing expert messagemakers to seduce consumers with sweet-talk about empowerment. As a result, the future now belongs to the big beasts: they’ve got the paid-up pre-need plans to prove it. It’s been a strategic masterstroke. Who wants today’s car, phone, anything tomorrow? No, we want the upgrade, next generation, as-yet-undreamt of. And yet… the funeral planners have conquered obsolescence . Hats off!

How to reverse this? By playing the big beasts at their own game? Golden Charter is fighting the good fight pluckily enough, but is beginning to look like the British army in Basra. In any case, there are far, far better ways of making provision for funeral expenses, ways which do not disempower those left behind.

No. The way forward is to get back onto the battleground of value for money, quality assurance and individuality. At a time like death people want to be looked after by a brilliant boutique business, not Funerals R Us. It ought to be easy enough.

It will need concerted action, though. Ay, there’s the rub.

So it’s really good to see a togetherness initiative come out of last week’s discussion of the new Co-op website MyLocalFuneralDirector. It was sparked by Nick Armstrong. He spotted that the Co-op had failed to buy mylocalfuneralservice.co.uk and yourlocalfuneralservice.co.uk.

“I’ll give you a guess who has just bought them. I’ll get a list of independent funeral directors on there as soon as I work out how to do it. Ill post back on here when I have a template up and running.:-) … It won’t be a quick thing as I want to get it right but it will be honest that’s for certain! If anyone has any ideas on compiling the database easily please let me know.”

His challenge was taken up by Andrew Hickson:

“Nick, here’s an idea off the top of my head. Follow it up, ignore it, change or work on it, I shan’t be offended by any of them!

It seems that there’s a fair bit of animosity and dislike of the website that is being discussed here, so, how about we, ourselves, research and compile a database? By this, I mean every reader and follower of this blog, each contributing what he or she knows.

I’d be surprised if between us we weren’t pretty well-informed of the true identities of a huge number of companies.

An immense task, and one which would require every contributor to be really focussed. But, very exciting, and think of the satisfaction when it was complete.

I’d be happy to help out wherever I could, so do let me know your thoughts!

This could be big if we all made it so … the start of a collaboration of FD’s willing to challenge the boundaries of the truth with which we all contend on a daily basis?”

Nick has responded:

“Hi Kingfisher. I’m game. Any help on content etc would be appreciated as well as any help with compiling a database. Thinking of a searchable google map with premises photos and branch info might be a good start. Bit more interactive than a list.

I’ve been doing one on my website with local churches, cemeteries etc. http://tinyurl.com/2v54rzz

I’m happy to build and host the site(s) and any info would be greatly appreciated.”

So there we are then. The go-to man is Nick: office@funeralhelp.co.uk.

Let’s make common cause!

Cheap boos

13 September 2010
Charles
No comments
Categories: Co-operative Funeralcare, coffins, Dignity, family funeral directors, funeral directors, funeral trends

Real ale made by boutique brewers has at last begun to drive down sales of lager for the first time in half a century reports yesterday’s Observer.

Intriguingly, the Society of Independent Brewers (Siba) reports that while its 420 members enjoyed a combined sales rise of 4 per cent last year, its smallest and boutique-iest brewers saw sales rise by 8.5 per cent. Small is good, smallest is best.

More good news. More young people are supping the Right Stuff. Of 25-34 year olds, the number of those who have tasted real ale rose from 28 per cent to 50 per cent in the period 2008-10. What’s more, the number of women rose from 16 per cent to 32 per cent in the same period.

Says Julian Grocock of Siba: “A lot of our members are professional brewers who have worked for the big brewers and have now set up their own business. They are brewing all sorts of beers … There’s now a huge variety out there.”

You see where I’m coming from?

If the little guys can turn the tables on the big beasts in the brewing trade it gives us hope that the same thing can happen in the funeral industry. (I understand that for the word ‘beasts’ you might like to substitute something stronger.)

Speaking of whom, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa) has named the Co-op Funeralcare coffin factory in Scotland as one of that country’s 99 dirtiest polluters. The story comes from the Sunday Herald, which describes the Co-op as “ethically conscious.” Hmph.

One family’s take on the perfect funeral

16 August 2010
Charles
4 Comments
Categories: DIY funeral, family funeral directors, Formality vs informality, home funerals

The following is taken from Ben Heald’s blog and so much speaks for itself that I don’t need to add another word:

Nothing can prepare you for losing close family suddenly; and I don’t want to dwell on the personal loss.  What I’d like to talk about is the learning I’ve taken from the experience of a family working together as a team to plan and carry through a funeral event.

The key intervention came from the funeral director (Andrew Smith in Macclesfield), who we found online in the Good Funeral Guide.  Just over 12 hours after Mum died, my sister Kate & I were in his office and he told us we mustn’t rush things, the funeral was principally for the living not the dead and the more the family got involved the better they’d feel about everything – 3 crucial differences from the approach we’d taken with my father’s funeral 17 years ago.

Mum wasn’t a church goer, and taken together with Andrew’s wise counsel, we quite quickly decided on the format.  Clearly funerals are personal, and there is absolutely no sense of being prescriptive, but this was our take on the perfect funeral:

  • We tried to speak to everyone in Mum’s address book to talk to them personally; even though we knew many of them would already have heard.
  • Before the funeral we spent time together for 3 days as an extended family (of 11) at Mum’s house.
  • The night before the funeral we stayed at the B&B accommodation on the barn complex, so were able to rehearse the night before and morning of the funeral.
  • We held it in a barn in the countryside away from main roads with a lake right outside (in fact traditionally a wedding venue).
  • We dug through all her old photos and had 20 of them scanned and blown up onto A2 boards.
  • We found the old cine films (that had been lost for 30 years) and had them transferred to DVD.
  • Six of Mum’s teenage grandchildren carried the coffin into the barn from the hearse.  To better prepare them we’d taken them all along to see her in the Chapel of Rest two days beforehand.
  • We selected a mixture of sacred and secular readings all read by the family.
  • We asked Mum’s cousin aged 79 to introduce the service and the various hymns/readings.
  • A friend of Mum’s played the piano accompaniment.
  • My son sang Gerald Finzi’s ‘Fear no more the heat of the sun’.
  • My brother Jonny sang a Native American Quechua spiritual.
  • Jonny & I played a duet on the piano – En Bateau from Debussy’s Petite Suite.
  • I delivered the address, which we’d all worked on together with inputs from Mum’s sister Judith.
  • Before the service we played Bach’s Goldberg variations and the coffin came into Rutter’s For the Beauty of the Earth.
  • Mum was actually cremated the following day, but no one attended (we described it when asked as a private cremation); which meant we could immediately start talking to everyone with tea, cake and champagne, surrounded by the gorgeous blown up photos.

As Andrew had advised, by getting involved and because we’d taken our time, the focus was on her life not her death.  The children also told us they felt they now knew her as a person, not just as a grandmother.  And because we’d worked together as an extended team, the bonds between us all have been strengthened.

So my recommendation would be not to specify what you want at your funeral, let the next generation work out together what’s right.  Just as in the business world, you shouldn’t micromanage your teams.

David vs Goliath

5 July 2010
Charles
10 Comments
Categories: family funeral directors, independent funeral directors

This blog gets as tired of the sound of its own voice as, probably, you do. So it welcomes guest posts from whoever wishes to sound off, air a view, explore an idea — whatever. If you would like to make use of this platform, please feel free. Just send me what you want to say at charles@goodfuneralguide.co.uk and I shall be delighted to post it — subject to the obvious provisos: it mustn’t be libellous, gratuitously offensive, etc.

Today we welcome back David Barrington.

Over to you, David:

For a while now I have been amazed by the lack of compassion shown by some of my fellow professionals to prospective clients. In fact, some of the comments just had to be turned into a posting for Charles and all his readers.

First of all there is the funeral arranger who when the family would not accept the coffin he was trying to sell them said:

“Oh okay so you just want a bulk standard one then?”

Maybe that was the only one they could afford. Did he know them personally? Also, surely all of the coffins are of good quality so what difference does it make to him? Or maybe it’s because he has a target to meet? Should funerals be subject to sales targets?

Next there was another person who when the family called for an estimate said before anything else:-

“We’ll need a deposit, you know.”

Again, what bearing does this have on the family’s question at this point? They are asking for an estimate and the funeral company’s representative is assuming they have money problems because they are shopping around.

While visiting a family with a terminally ill relative (who was present at the meeting) I was told about another funeral director who had visited them to discuss funeral costs. The other funeral service representative worked for one of the larger funeral businesses.

Now obviously visiting somebody in this situation is uncomfortable at first, both for them and you and the first thing to do is put them at ease. Show you care, ask about their background, how long they’ve been ill etc.

The guy from the big company turned up dressed as a pallbearer (the family’s words).  When he came into the room where they were, he sat down, didn’t pass the time of day with them, plonked a copy of their brochure down on the table and said:

“Have a look through that and tell me what you want and I’ll let you know how much it is.”

That was pretty much it! For that service, for which the family would pay a premium of around £750 – £1000 more than me.

How can a funeral professional show such a lack of humanity and compassion? Did he think he was selling them a fridge or a washing machine? The lady going in the coffin was sitting there in front of him and he didn’t ask her how she would like to be remembered; what music she wants at her service; how she would like to be dressed; who she would want as the minister and whether she would want to meet him.

The person whose funeral it was to be told her family to tear up the brochure when he left.

One last incident that you should hear. Recently we had a funeral going to our local crematorium. We turned into the driveway and I got out of the hearse to walk the last 100 yards in front of the hearse. As I was walking slowly along, another funeral turned into the driveway and proceeded to go in the out lane, overtake us and pull into the crematorium chapel.  It transpired that they were late for their slot and wanted to get in first. I was absolutely speechless, however the funeral director had only been working for them for 6 months and had been let loose on the public so, I suppose, what do you expect? Again, a large company who charge about £1000 more than me.

These large companies say that they have the best training and development of their staff. Well, where is the evidence of this?

What can I say about these other guys except HOW DARE YOU treat our profession so shoddily and these families so thoughtlessly.

Going the extra mile feels so much better.

Local hero

28 September 2009
Charles
No comments
Categories: Co-op, Co-operative Funeralcare, family funeral directors, funeral cost

In the matter of household shopping we look back nostalgically to the high street of yesteryear. Ah, those were the days. The butcher, the baker, the grocer. Ooh, hello, Postman Pat! In every shop a cheery greeting. And great personal service.

Gone. For ever. Whatever happened to them?

You bankrupted them. Yes, you.

You trooped off to the unloveable supermarket, didn’t you, where the food is fresher, the choice greater, the prices lower? Sure, the experience is impersonal, but does that bother you? No. You can look after yourself, thank you very much.

Small may be beautiful but bigger is better. Beastly it may be, but biggest is best.

Affordability is the critical factor here. Yes, a handbuilt car is the one you’d like. In your dreams. Back here on earth, c’mon let’s get grounded, the mass produced car is the one you can afford.

Funerals are no exception. You don’t want a production line funeral. You don’t want to be borne to your final resting place by Tesco. You don’t want to deal with a faceless organisation. You’d rather interact with humans who seem to care about you, have time for you, people who answer to you, not their line manager.

You want a bespoke, handbuilt, boutique funeral. Because small is beautiful.

And here we come to one of the great paradoxes of the funeral industry:

You can have one!

Any business which can reduce its unit price can make itself more affordable. Any undertaking enterprise that can open a few branches, share a car pool, operate a central mortuary, drive deals with coffin makers and other suppliers and work its employees to death, can, according to the immutable laws of business, do it cheaper. Obviously.

But they don’t.

In fact, a handbuilt funeral, a boutique undertaker, is likely to cost you considerably less than one of the big chains.

Whaa?! Why do they charge more?

Because they can. Because they’re greedy.

If you’re not going to compete on price, what’s left? Service, of course. But service, as we know, consumes time. It is the first victim of economies of scale. That doesn’t matter a bit if you’re buying your groceries. But when you buy a funeral, it’s service that matters most.

And it’s because the big chains of funeral directors, most of them, can’t offer what most people want most—service—that they’ve got nothing to boast about. So, when they buy up a small, independent undertaker, they don’t put a huge poster in the window proclaiming UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT! Oh no. They go on sort of pretending to be the little guy they bought out. Are they ashamed to confess who they are? You answer that. Is this practice a bit shady? The judgement is entirely yours.

Can’t be too careful in my business. I used to hold the romantic notion that the law was all about justice until a property developer, enraged by my naïveté, told me it was all about intimidation. “You hire the most expensive barrister you can afford and you bloody well terrify the living s**t out of them!” he yelled patiently. He did it a lot. The yelling, too. He drove a handbuilt car.

Down in Sandhurst, Berkshire, Holmes and Sons, Funeral Directors, are keen to point out to their customers the difference between themselves and their competitors. This is the point of marketing: to define your USP and set yourself apart. Would that other funeral directors understood this First Law. On their unusually well written website David Holmes says this:

Locally it can be hard to know who is who in the funeral business. Some companies trade with names that can easily confuse. Camberley & District funeral directors are in fact the Co-op, as are George Parker in Yateley. In Fleet the Co-op name appears above the door. In some parts of Surrey & Hampshire, the Office of Fair Trading has forced the Co-op to sell some funeral businesses. They had become too dominant, there was a lack of real competition said the OFT. The Co-op´s legal people insist we tell you that being big doesn´t of course mean being bad.

In Fleet, Farnborough and Frimley the Goddards & Ford–Mears firms are in fact owned by a major independent UK car dealer. Mr Goddard sold out many years ago; we suspect local families would have no idea who actually owns the businesses nowadays, they just remember the name. In Aldershot ´Finches´ are now part of Dignity Plc, a major national chain trading with hundreds of names.

We believe bereaved families benefit from dealing with owners rather than managers answering to distant directors. With David Holmes & Sons YOU are the priority, not Head Office rules and figures. Our service is second to none – our charges are reasonable. We´re not under pressure to sell you anything. For your protection, we are members of both respected trade associations.

The gist of what Mr Holmes has to say here is easily grasped: he is beset by Co-ops and by branches belonging to other funeral chains, and they are not, he reckons, trading transparently. Many of these branches are owned by Southern Co-operatives, an independent Co-op society which, nonetheless, is about to re-brand its funeral operation under Funeralcare, yet retain its independence. Confused? I am. Why the heck would they want to do that?

 

The OFT did, indeed, compel The Co-operative Group Limited (CWG), the mother of Funeralcare, to sell off some of its branches following its purchase of the Fairways Group in 2006. The OFT’s grounds were that this acquisition could result in substantial lessening of competition in specified areas. When CWG proposed to sell some of its branches to Southern Co-ops it was told that it must not on the grounds that Southern was not “independent of and unconnected to CGL”.

 

All this information is in the public domain. Mr Holmes’s facts are easily checked and verified.

 

But his is a new business in the area. He is an independent, and proud of it. What, therefore, is the response of the Co-op? Raise its game? Trade transparently? Meet Mr Holmes on his own ground?

None of the above. They want to meet him in the High Court. Yes, can you believe it, they’re threatening legal action against Mr Holmes unless he removes the reference to the Office of Fair Trading. Is this Southern Co-ops or Funeralcare doing the suing? Sue King, press officer at Southern Co-ops, has promised to tell me.

Nice one, Co-op. If you can’t beat em, trash em.

 

In your dreams.

People like people like us

10 November 2008
Charles
No comments
Categories: family funeral directors, funeral directors

Saturday was National Bereavement Awareness Day. Miss it? Whoops. Let me fill you in.

A brainchild of the independent funeral directors’ trade body, SAIF, the day was a marketing tool designed to raise the profile of independents. My local funeral directors, James Giles and Sons of Bromsgrove, held an open day. They’ve recently refurbished, so they had a service of dedication, too, and roped in the local MP. They asked me to come along and talk about what I do. I work with families who don’t want a full-on religious funeral ceremony.

My work ethic doesn’t normally extend to Saturdays and, as I knotted a reluctant tie, I wondered in how many households anyone darkly muttering, “Hey, we can go to the open day at undertakers” was being met by an enthusiastic answering chorus of “Yes, lets!”

I got there deliberately too late for the holy part of the proceedings. Rain was falling unkindly on the horse-drawn hearse in the yard. But inside, the scene was unexpectedly one of warmth and cheeriness. People had come. Lots of them. My spirits woke up. The refurb is great — light and bright and airy. There were even people who wanted to talk to me, so we talked and we considered what the purpose of a funeral is and looked at the options and I wished the Good Funeral Guide was already out there to guide them. They’d been up to the mortuary, seen the fridges, found out what really goes on. It was a true open day — an eye-opener.

There was wine and fruit juice, tea and coffee, sandwiches and sausage rolls. But there was no hush or awkwardness. There was more of a party atmosphere and lots of laughter. It set me thinking.

These guys at Giles and Sons don’t big themselves up in shuddermaking clothes and set themselves self-importantly apart. They’re not trend-setters, either, but they’ll ungrudgingly do anything they’re asked (“so long as it’s legal”). They are friends, neighbours, members of the local community — everyone knows them — and they do what they do with a kindness and a naturalness which makes the business of arranging a funeral normal, natural, so much easier than people dread. This makes an enormous difference to their relationship with, and experience of, death. That’s why people came to their open day: because the Gileses are people like us, and people like us are the people we like. Almost every one who works there is a member of the family. They are the very best sort of family funeral directors.

When people talk about how funerals can be improved, undertakers can come in for plenty of criticism for their resistance to change.  Many of them deserve some. But if funerals are too often bleak and meaningless affairs it is a mistake to point the finger exclusively at the undertakers. There are other more influential factors at work. It takes too long to arrange a cremation. Twenty minutes is not enough for a proper send-off. A religious ceremony is an absurd choice for unbelievers. Above all, the bereaved are too content to play a passive role in the process.

Funerals will only improve when informed consumers start calling the shots. When they do, we can be sure about this: James Giles and Sons, and countless other family funeral directors throughout the land, will be only too happy to do as they are asked — so long as it’s legal.