At Funeral Director Daily we don’t “break news” — we report on it and offer experienced analysis, ideas, and suggestions on the news that has happened.  That being said, the headline for this article on the resignations of three Tribute Technology employees does not come as a surprise to me.

This news was “broke” by the newsletter of Connecting Directors and I learned of it last Friday from Connecting Directors.  Here’s some excerpts from that news article that I received:

• “Tribute Technology, one of the biggest players in deathcare tech, has announced that Charlie Cole has resigned from his position as Chief Executive Officer, effective immediately. Also resigning are Chief Financial Officer Frances DeBlasio and Head of Transformation Alex Cross.”

• “This news comes less than 24 hours after the closing of the 2024 National Funeral Directors Association (NFDA) International Convention and Expo, at which Cole participated in the Tribute Technology booth.”

• “All three resignations come less than two years into these individuals’ tenure at Tribute Technology. Cole joined the company in March 2023, while DeBlasio and Cross were added in April and February of the same year.”

Here’s a press release that we received later from Tribute Technology on the information

Here’s a page from the Tribute Technology website titled “Meet our new CEO”.  It’s dated June 23, 2023.

Tom Anderson
Funeral Director Daily

Funeral Director Daily take:  I mentioned that this news does not come as a surprise to me because as I walked the Expo floor at last week’s National Funeral Director Association (NFDA) convention, I was told that there were companies in our profession that will be looking to make changes going forward.  Some of those changes, depending on the company, had to do with finances, some simply had to do with “personnel fit”,  and some had to do with industry relationships.  In all honesty, I was not told that Tribute Technologies was one of these companies. . . so I’m still waiting for a shoe to drop at other businesses.

Why?  I’m of the opinion that the last two years has been extremely difficult in many of the traditional funeral home and related Death Care profession industries.  I don’t have to tell you that inflationary cost pressures coupled with the rise of interest rates nicks into profit margins and for some businesses will drop profits into losses.

And, according to this article from U.S. News and World Report there was also a 6.1% drop in death rate from 2022 thru 2023.  So, a combination of higher costs coupled with less deaths, on a nationwide basis, will cause some businesses some problems.

In addition, according to Service Corporation International CEO Thomas Ryan in a statement from the company’s 2nd Quarter 2024 Earnings Report on August 1 of this year that death decline seems to be continuing.  Here’s what CEO Ryan said at that time:

• “Funeral volumes tracked our expectations during the first four months of the year, and we saw an unexpected decline in May and June. . . . .We believe the COVID pull forward effect combined with lower excess deaths across our markets contributed to the decline in services for the quarter.”

So, when I walked the Expo hall at NFDA and heard rumors I kind of parked them in the back of my mind and decided to wait and see what comes of them.  I wouldn’t be surprised if resignations at Tribute Technology are not the only employee related issues we hear about in the profession in the near future.  Again, in my opinion, some companies just don’t believe that they have the “correct fit” with the leaders they have in place to move forward in a profession that is somewhat moving from a “family oriented” to a “corporate oriented” transition.

Funeral Service is a “Long-game”:  One of the things that may come to Death Care that has somewhat been absent, because of the family nature of the business for a long period of time is that results may not be viewed as much over the perspective of the “Long-Haul” as they have traditionally been.  Family owners of differing products and services in Death Care, in my opinion, were much more open to looking at financial results on the “Long-term” in the past.

We’ve discussed it in this forum before that private equity, venture capital, and others from outside the traditional “funeral business” have entered Death Care in recent years.  It’s my opinion that these players are much more analytical and “short-term” in their financial analysis of business than, what I would term, the “old funeral” establishment.

I also believe that these companies are much more apt to take decisive business actions quicker, whether it be for additional resources or personnel related, than many of the old-guard companies did.

While I have no idea with what really happened that resulted in three resignations of executives at Tribute Technology, I do think that this fairly new relationship between “new money” in Death Care and the established “Long-game” of Death Care may result in less long-term relationships across the profession as time goes by.

. . . At least that is my analysis and idea on the subject. . . . but, I still think relationships will matter going forward even in the growing world of corporate Death Care.

Related —  Here’s a 2020 article from Funeral Director Daily dealing with part of the inception and growth of Tribute Technology.

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EXCLUSIVE: Charlie Cole Out as Tribute Technology CEO

Tribute Technology, one of the biggest players in deathcare tech, has announced that Charlie Cole has resigned from his position as Chief Executive Officer, effective immediately. Also resigning are Chief Financial Officer Frances DeBlasio and Head of Transformation Alex Cross.

This news comes less than 24 hours after the closing of the 2024 National Funeral Directors Association (NFDA) International Convention and Expo, at which Cole participated in the Tribute Technology booth.

In an exclusive interview with Connecting Directors today, Courtney Gould Miller shared that these resignations will not disrupt operations at Tribute, nor will it impact the level of service the company has always provided to its customers. She adds that customers should not be concerned about the financial position of the company.

“First of all, I can say there is no concern from a financial perspective,” says Gould Miller. “In fact, we’ve recently announced how our board and the executive team have approved over $5 million in investment on our tech roadmap and operational support. That is remaining the same. We are excited about the future and looking forward to pursuing all of the roadmap and objectives that we’ve had.” 

Gould Miller, a veteran of the funeral profession with more than 30 years of experience in deathcare and a longtime member of the Tribute executive team, has been promoted to the position of President of Commercial Markets from her former roles as Chief Customer Officer and Chief Marketing Officer. She acknowledged that although these leadership changes may seem sudden, they are actually part of a larger plan. 

“The ‘why’ behind this is that Tribute has been going through a strategic review over the last few months, looking at everything from feedback of our many valued customers to what we’re hearing in the market … what we see in technology outside of the profession as well as inside, and what kind of team we need to go after that. This really was a mutual decision to move forward against that strategic plan.” 

All three resignations come less than two years into these individuals’ tenure at Tribute Technology. Cole joined the company in March 2023, while DeBlasio and Cross were added in April and February of the same year.

Over the last several months, many deathcare professionals have questioned the company’s perspective toward other funeral home website providers based on comments made by Cole. At DISRUPT Media’s 2024 Funeral (Un)Conference, Cole seemed to target competitors Tukios and Legacy.com, and at the Selected Independent Funeral Home Annual Meeting earlier this month, Cole said that Tribute’s goal was to put non-Tribute customers “out of business.”

“I want to put your competitors out of business because they don’t use our websites,” Cole said during his Selected presentation. “I mean it. And I’m going to. I have two funeral homes that churned off Tribute in the last 12 months that are in my sights, that I am actively optimizing their competitors’ websites.”

Gould Miller responded to those comments during today’s interview with Ryan Thogmartin:

Tribute Technology is one of the largest providers of funeral home websites, serving more than 10,000 customers — more than half of the funeral homes in the United States. Brands under the Tribute umbrella include SRS Computing and CFS, as well as non-website-related Legacy Touch.

Gould Miller assured Connecting Directors that all of these brands are being supported by Tribute Technology, and that competing offerings nor the recent resignations will change the tech roadmap. In fact, there are no plans to sunset any of these brands.

“We have a very aggressive roadmap that we’re excited to get after,” she says. “We have not only features coming to support software like SRS and our platforms like CFS. We want to support those for our funeral homes, make them better for our funeral homes, and of course, invest in our technology like Tribute websites and Tribute Management Software to be the very, very best in the profession.”