The product that has turned every sadness into a sales-op and every funeral into a retail event?
“The ‘buy now, die later’ brand of package deal has meant a lost connection between the sale of funerals and the delivery of them, and with it the loss of face-to-face accountability between buyer and seller that used to provide reliable consumer protection. Now the recipient of the services (the bereaved) and the provider […]
The man from the Pru
Guest post by Quokkagirl When I was no’but a girl, I used to like Friday evenings…..because the man from the Pru used to call. I say the Pru but it could have been any insurance company. I don’t recall the specifics, but it was an insurance man. This was an exciting event because in his […]
What do you want at your funeral?
Guest blogger RR writes today for ‘the silent majority of consumers’. With the plethora of funeral options, some people choose to give their own send-off advance thought and leave instructions to their next of kin. This brief survey aims to focus the mind on some of the boxes that might need to be ticked. If […]
Funeral wishes are no more than wishful thinking
‘You can decide everything in advance if you wish, down to the kind of music you’d like – and there’s no charge for changing or updating your wishes at a later stage.’ Golden Charter ‘…pre-planning your funeral is actually a thoughtful and responsible way to show that you care your family … your family are spared […]
Big is beautiful
Golden Charter just got bigger. It’s now going to be the conduit through which Sun Life will sell its over-50s life assurance plans to those who ask for a funeral benefit option. As Golden Charter say, this “significantly boosts Golden Charter’s market share and choice for consumers”. The reckoning is that Sun Life Direct customers will […]
Your kids, your legacy
From today’s Times Diary: Given a reminder of mortality by Michael Schumacher’s recent accident, Sir Matthew Pinsent, who is a year younger than the German racing driver, decided to have a serious talk with his three children about his plans in the event of anything happening to him and his wife. The oarsman-turned-presenter discussed wills, […]
Apocalypse? What apocalypse?
There’s a wide and growing measure of agreement that the next big scandal to hit the funeral industry is going to centre on pre-need funeral plans. On the one hand, there is intensifying anxiety concerning the robustness of trust funds. There are dark and disturbing rumours flying around about plans coming in underfunded. On the […]
Location, location, location
Guest post by author and journalist Ann Treneman. Over the past four years, I have spent almost all my spare time in cemeteries for my new book ‘Finding the Plot: 100 Graves to Visit Before You Die‘. One of the key things that I have discovered is that having the right funeral is all about planning. There’s […]
What the…
An undertaker passed on to us the email below. Anybody know anything about Liviana? It’s difficult to believe that any outfit marketing itself in such sub-literate terms could achieve any sort of credibility. The netherworld of pre-pay funeral plans just got murkier. Dear Sirs , Just a quick introduction email from me today. Allow […]
Death Over Dinner
It seems that Death Cafe has spawned a little brother, birthplace Portland Oregon, dob sometime earlier this summer. It’s name is Death Over Dinner. The aims of Death Over Dinner are pretty much the same as those of Death Cafe, namely, to get folk together to talk about you-know-what. It’s the initiative of Michael Hebb, […]
