Funeral Director Daily recently published an article on the merits of Guaranteed Preneeds vs. Non-Guaranteed Preneed contracts.  In that article we discovered an inflation calculator that helped us explain the costs involved as insurance value grows and the cost to provide a funeral also grows.

I had some fun with the calculator and also decided it would be fun to see how costs of items, including funerals, have grown in the past 45 years. . . . . And, not only grown, but grown against other types of expenses and purchases.

The following table will show nine categories that I looked up prices.  I looked up “average” prices for the years 1980 (when I entered the work force), 2000 (when approximately today’s 45-50 year olds entered the work force) and last year (2024).  I then took the 2024 price and divided by the 1980 price which gives an approximate of the multiple that that particular product has increased in 44 years.

For funeral home pricing I looked at the cost of a traditional funeral that included professional services and casket but no cemetery or monument costs.  My study found those prices by, in general, looking up National Funeral Director Association (NFDA) statements on the subject. . . . This exercise is not meant to be absolutely scientific but more a general feeling of where funeral costs fit in the overall price increase equation.

Here are the categories that I found easily accessible and the data I found on the subjects.  As you can see, traditional funeral prices have increased an approximate multiple of 4.58 times the 1980 costs.  While that multiple is larger than some items I found including median household income, it is certainly less than new home construction or the cost of post-high school education and family health insurance premiums.

Costs of Products/Services from 1980 to 2024

Tom Anderson
Funeral Director Daily

Funeral Director Daily take:  I think that this chart puts funeral costs into perspective.  From my point of view, funeral homes have done pretty well in holding down costs of these services when you look at the comparison to the Median Household Income multiple —  they are very similar.

So, if price isn’t the problem, what is?  The problem for funeral home profitability is that the percentage of casketed, traditional funerals has went from about 85% of the total Death Care services in 1980 to probably about 35% of total Death Care services in 2024.  And, that large decrease is back-filled by cremation services which bring in less revenue.

Undergraduate Tuition —  There is no doubt that there are two main factors responsible for the growth of Higher Education undergraduate tuition.  The first is the fact that state legislatures, with their appropriation choices, have made Higher Education a private good rather than a public benefit good.  Virtually, all legislatures have increased the appropriations for Higher Education at lower levels than most other budget line items.  In my state of Minnesota, the legislature appropriated 7.1% of the budget to Higher Education in 2000 and that number is only 5.2% of the budget in 2024.

The result of that choice is that when I went to college in the 1970’s, the State of Minnesota contributed about 75% of the cost of college while I paid about 25%. . . . I learned from my time on the U of Minnesota Board that that ratio has now been “flipped on its head” whereby a state picks up about 25% of the cost and the student and/or their family picks up 75% of the cost.  Legislators have found other uses for monies previously appropriated to Higher Education.

Secondly, the advent of “Guaranteed Student Loans” has allowed colleges to raise their prices without a serious budgetary thought process.  Students who really want to go to college are simply walked over to the financial aid office and instructed how they can finance their eduction not always realizing the ramifications of debt repayment in the future.

Health Care Costs —  America faces a crisis if Health Care premiums and the costs that require those premiums cannot be dealt with.  On the other hand, America has raised its life expectancy on its citizens to 79.25 years from 73.61 years in 1980.  So, Americans are getting a life-span of almost 8% more in those 44 years. . . .What price is that worth?

Personally, I don’t think it is the Health Care insurance premiums that are the problem. . . . it is the medical costs driving those premiums.  People a lot smarter than me have to figure out how to get those costs in check if we are going to see a decrease anytime soon.  And, if we don’t see a decrease in health care costs all businesses, including funeral homes, are going to see headwinds to profitability in the case of continually rising employee health insurance benefits.

Will Technology help?  —  I always think of my time on a regional Wells Fargo board when I think of technology.  Banks have greatly increased their profitability because of technology — in the case of banks, internet banking specifically.

I can remember when Wells Fargo was just starting internet banking around the years 1998 or so.  One aspect I remember from a meeting is that it was brought to our attention that a bank transaction involving a teller cost the bank about $1, a bank transaction using an ATM machine cost the bank about 10 cents, and an internet transaction cost the bank less than 1 cent.  That’s a big reason banks pushed internet banking so much.

And consider that from that time, banks have went from having about 90% of their transactions with a teller to probably about 90%, or more, of their transactions online. . . . . .That technology has been a huge money maker for banks — especially when you consider they have less need for large, high priced locations and less use of consumer face-to-face staff.

I’m waiting to find out what the technology will be in Death Care that will have that result.

More news from the world of Death Care:

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“A servant’s attitude guided by Christ leads to a significant life”

Fun with Fingerprints & 11 Costco Deals | 4M #194

Welcome to the hundred-and-ninety-fourth edition of Morticians’ Monday Morning Mashup, 4M #194, where we’ll serve up bite-sized, easily-digestible nuggets of the deathcare news you need to crush conversations in the week ahead. Bon appetit!

This week’s dumb criminal

Remember a few months ago when the 4M mentioned that thieves had resorted to stealing $30,000 doors off of cemetery mausoleums. Our take was that bronze markers and vases were just small change in the illegal metals market, so why not go big? Well, now at least one of the criminals responsible for heists in several Pennsylvania cemeteries is going to the big house, because he made one very dumb mistake. He left his discarded saw blade at the scene — covered in his fingerprints. Gotcha!

We’re not claiming him

It seems that the man accused of assassinating Minnesota Speaker Emerita Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark and shooting Minnesota state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, has a background in deathcare (we’re not going to call him a deathcare professional). Separate stories have identified the alleged shooter, Vance Boelter, as a former student at Des Moines Area Community College in Iowa as well as a former funeral home worker at Metro First Call, a funeral home based in Savage, Minnesota. The owner of Metro First Call shared that Boelter was employed from August 28, 2023 until he “voluntarily left” on February 20, 2025.

On a much lighter note (maybe?)

Hilaria Baldwin, wife of actor Alec Baldwin and mother of seven of his children, recently shared during a podcast that she regularly takes her kids to cemeteries to ensure that they “don’t develop a fear of dying.” She explained, “Once you become a parent, I think that how fragile life can be, it comes into my fears all the time. But I really feel like, we spend time in cemeteries and everything from the history of it and just also acknowledging, this is part of life.”

Watch out for number 10

Last week a blog shared a list of the “11 Best Costco Deals Most Members Don’t Even Know Exist.” Sliding in at number 10 was the “luxurious and sleek Titan Orion Series steel casket,” which Costco members can purchase for $1,299.99 (it’s $1,499 for the non-members). Other items on the list include Yo Mama’s Vodka Tomato Sauce (number 1),  Dearfoams flip-flops (number 7), and the ZLINE Autograph Edition 24 in. Touchstone 151 Can Beverage Fridge (last but not least at number 11).

I received a general e-mail from Tukios last week inviting me to join the fun with their “March Madness” event.  People from all over the world will be watching the NCAA Collegiate National Championship play-downs this year and filling out their bracket of winners.

Thanks to our friends at Tukios we can do the same thing and compete against our brothers and sisters in Death Care.

Click here to get to “Tukios Madness”

Here are some instructions from Tukios that I received in the e-mail:

1.  Join the “Tukios March Madness” group (Password: createravingfans).
2.  Create your bracket! 1 Entry per person. Make sure to include your first and last name in your bracket name so we can send prizes to the right winners.

“Get ready for the Tukios Bracket Challenge and a chance to win some awesome Tukios swag!”

My Experience:  When I signed up as Funeral Director Daily I was prompted to create an account with Disney/ESPN

Related — Last summer I was fortunate enough to be invited on the Tukios Podcast “Podcasket” and had a conversation with Tukios founder Curtis Funk.  If you listen to the broadcast you will learn that both Mr. Funk and myself, in addition to working in the greater Death Care industry, have an affinity for enjoying sporting events.

Here is the Podcasket episode featuring Funeral Director Daily’s Tom Anderson

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“A servant’s attitude guided by Christ leads to a significant life”

Election Day Trivia: Fun Facts About Dead Presidents

Happy Election Day, everyone! Tomorrow our country will have elected the 47th President of the United States … finally. It’s been a long, strange trip of an election year, and no matter how you feel about the results, at least most of us can agree that we will be glad when it’s behind us. 

But while we wait for those electoral votes to be tallied, why not reflect on the more interesting aspects of the POTUSes who have gone before us — the dead ones, at least. We’ll start with perhaps the most popular bit of death-related trivia …

8 presidents have died in office

Four presidents died of natural causes: William Henry Harrison (pneumonia, 31 days into his presidency), Zachary Taylor (gastroenteritis from eating bad cherries), Warren G. Harding (heart attack), and Franklin D. Roosevelt (cerebral hemorrhage) 

Four presidents were assassinated: Abraham Lincoln (gunshot wounds), James A. Garfield (septic shock from infection from gunshot wounds), William McKinley (gangrene from gunshot wounds), and John F. Kennedy (gunshot wounds)

Reagan broke the death curse

For more than 160 years, many people believed that presidents elected in a year ending in zero would die in office, thanks to the so-called Curse of Tippecanoe. Legend has it that Shawnee leader Tecumseh hated William Henry Harrison so fiercely that he placed the curse on not only Harrison, but all future presidents — and year after zero-ending election year, it seemed to come true. Seven of the above-named eight presidents who died in office were elected in a year ending with zero, including Harrison (elected in 1840). Only Zachary Taylor, who was elected in the non-cursed year of 1849 (but died in 1850) was not a supposed victim.

Despite assassination attempts, however, Ronald Reagan (elected in 1980) and George H. W. Bush (elected in 2000) did not die in office, and if Biden (elected in 2020) can make it through the night, he will be the third president to break the Curse of Tippecanoe.

Reagan’s was the most expensive presidential funeral

When Ronald Reagan died in 2004, his seven-day funeral eclipsed John F. Kennedy’s $15 million goodbye with a total price tag of more than $400 million. But that tally wasn’t due to a solid gold casket or an extravagant crypt. Instead, the real cost of the funeral skyrocketed because then-President George W. Bush declared a national day of mourning, closing the stock market and giving all federal employees the day off, racking up those millions in internal expenses. (Fun fact: $13 million of JFK’s total funeral expense was the purchase of his burial plot in Arlington National Cemetery).

Presidents plan their funerals when they take office

According to the White House Historical Association, each president is “asked to attend to the strange task of imagining his own funeral service” shortly after taking the oath of office. They are tasked with selecting “personal touches that can elucidate their character and legacy on a national stage for the last time.”

Four presidents were buried in a Marcellus casket

The Marcellus Casket Company, founded in 1872, produced exquisite “Rolls Royce”-quality caskets until 2003 — including those in which four U.S. presidents are buried. Kennedy, Nixon, Truman, and Reagan were all buried in Marcellus caskets. The last casket to roll off the Marcellus production line was a “The President” model 710 — and that same casket is now on display at the National Museum of Funeral History in Houston. 

JFK’s first casket was sunk to the bottom of the ocean

Although President John F. Kennedy was buried in a hand-rubbed-500-year-old-African-mahogany Marcellus 710, his body first rested in a Handley Britannia casket from the Elgin Casket Company. The Elgin casket suffered so much interior damage during initial transport due to the president’s horrendous wounds that it was not fit for public viewing and was replaced by the 710. After more than one year in the possession of the funeral home that embalmed Kennedy, the Elgin casket was moved to the National Archives to keep it away from the “morbidly curious.” In 1966, at the request of the Kennedy family, the casket was buried at sea by the U.S. Air Force, who drilled 42 holes and placed three 80-pound sandbags in the box, then dropped it into the Atlantic Ocean, adding two parachutes to ensure it wouldn’t break apart.

Presidents are buried in only 18 states (and one district)

The 39 presidents who have died are buried in only 18 different states and the District of Columbia, leaving 32 states with no presidential plots. The state that’s most saturated is Virginia, which is the resting place of seven dead presidents: Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Tyler, Taft, and Kennedy. The only presidents who are buried in the same cities are father-son duo John Adams and John Quincy Adams (Quincy, Massachusetts), Andrew Jackson and James K. Polk (Nashville, Tennessee), James Monroe and John Tyler (Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond, Virginia) and William Howard Taft and John F. Kennedy (Arlington Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia).

These Deathcare-Themed Cocktails Actually Could Put Way More “Fun” Into Funerals

It’s Halloween. You’re still recovering from your “work trip” to New Orleans. Or maybe you have a super cool speakeasy tucked away in your funeral home. These are all perfect excuses to craft and enjoy these deathcare-themed cocktails! 

Ingredients:

• 1 oz Sour apple pucker
• 1/2 oz Blue Curacao
• 1/2 oz Rum
• 5 oz Pineapple juice
• 1 splash Sprite

Instructions: Fill the glasses full of ice. Set the glasses to the side. In a cocktail shaker add your liquors and pineapple juice. Pour your mix into your glass. Top off with Sprite.

Death in the Afternoon (from MK Library)

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 oz Absinthe 
• 4 1/2 oz Champagne or dry sparkling wine

Instructions: Pour absinthe into a coupe glass. Top with champagne.

Bloody Morguerita (from Six Storeys)

Ingredients: 

• 1 1/2 oz Tequila
• 1 oz Triple Sec
• 1 oz fresh Lime Juice
• 2 oz Cranberry Juice
• 1/2 oz Simple Syrup
• Red Food Coloring optional for extra “bloody” effect
• Ice
• Lime Wheel or Wedge for garnish
• Coarse Salt or Sugar for rimming

Instructions: Start by running a lime wedge around the rim of your margarita glass. Then dip the rim into a plate of coarse salt or sugar – your choice! In a cocktail shaker, combine the Tequila, Triple Sec, fresh Lime Juice, Cranberry Juice, and Simple Syrup. Add a few drops of red food coloring if you want a darker, more vivid red. Fill the shaker with ice, and shake vigorously for about 15-20 seconds. Strain the mixture into your prepared, ice-filled margarita glass. Add a lime wheel or wedge on the rim.

Ingredients:

• 1 oz dark rum
• 1 – 1/2 oz Blackberry Liqueur
• 2 oz pomegranate juice
• Few dashes Angostura bitters
• Soda water
• Blackberries, to serve

Instructions: In an ice filled cocktail shaker, combine all ingredients besides soda water. Shake vigorously to combine. In an ice filled rocks glass, pour cocktail carefully. Top off with soda water. Add skewered blackberries for garnish. 

Ingredients:

• 1 ounce Black vodka (1 cup black rice and 1 bottle marshmallow vodka)
• Red decorating sugar
• Ice cubes
• 1 ounce black vodka1 ounce coffee liqueur, like Sabroso Licor de Café
• 1/4 teaspoon Frangelico liqueur

Instructions for black vodka: Place one cup of black rice in a clean quart-sized Ball jar. Fill the rest of the Ball jar with marshmallow vodka. Store for 24 hours in a cool, shady area. Shake occasionally. Drain contents of the Ball jar over a fine-mesh sieve into a pitcher or large quart measuring cup with a pouring spout. Toss the rice. Wash out the Ball jar and pour black vodka back into the jar. Label the jar. Cap with a pouring spout.

Instructions for cocktail: Place red decorating sugar in a small dish. Turn the glass upside down and dip it into a small bowl of water. Dip the rim of the glass into the sugar. Carefully place ice cubes into the glass. In a small measuring cup with a spout, mix the vodka, coffee liqueur, and Frangelico together. Pour over ice and serve.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKxkLKggTlo

Here’s a good news story for a change.

New Zealand seniors are forming Coffin Clubs to build their own coffins, adding their personal style with paint and other decorations for when the time comes when they might need to use it.

The do-it-yourself movement began in 2010, started by a palliative care nurse, Katie Williams, in a makeshift workshop in her garage in Rotorua, on the North Island. She got some volunteer handymen to help local seniors build their own coffins — they are made from particleboard kits and are shaped like traditional caskets or as rectangles.

“Because of my work and my age I had become a perpetual mourner,” Williams told The Guardian newspaper.

“I had seen lots of people dying and their funerals were nothing to do with the vibrancy and life of those people,” she said. “You would not know what they were really like. That they had lived and laughed and loved. I had a deep-seated feeling that people’s journey’s deserved a more personal farewell.”

“I’m going down with Elvis,” says this Coffin Club member.

There are now more than a dozen coffin clubs in New Zealand. Seniors found it was fun painting and decorating their own coffins and a great way for many lonely seniors to socialize with others in the same age group, many of whom had loved one pass away.

“We like to say it is only a box until you put someone in it,” one woman told the New York Times in a story published earlier this year.

The boxes can also double as furniture at home — one woman uses hers as a seating area with cushions.

The coffin kits cost about $170, much less than what a funeral home charges for a coffin of similar quality. Club membership ranges from $7 to $17 a year.