NFDA Applauds Congress for Introducing Legislation to Protect Grieving Families

Brookfield, Wis. – As the foremost advocate for grieving families and the funeral service profession, the National Funeral Directors Association (NFDA) commends Congress for introducing two critical pieces of legislation that will provide much-needed oversight to the whole-body donation process and financial relief for funeral expenses.

The Consensual Donation and Research Integrity Act (S. 1270/H.R. 2589) and the Funeral Coverage Act (H.R. 2436) reflect NFDA’s unwavering commitment to ensuring fairness, transparency and dignity in funeral service.

These bills, along with several others, will be a key focus for NFDA members as they advocate on behalf of the profession during the upcoming NFDA Advocacy Summit, April 9-11 in Washington, D.C. 

Consensual Donation and Research Integrity Act 

The Consensual Donation and Research Integrity Act (S. 1270/H.R. 2589), introduced this week by Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) and Rep. Gus Bilirakis (R-FL), aims to bring federal oversight to the currently unregulated industry of whole-body donation. While donating a loved one’s body for scientific research is an admirable choice that can aid medical research and advancements, families have been devastated by unscrupulous body brokers who exploit their generosity. 

NFDA has long championed federal regulation to ensure dignity and transparency in the whole-body donation process. NFDA President Chris Robinson, CFSP, CCO, emphasized, “This legislation is crucial to holding non-transplant tissue banks accountable and ensuring that donors and their families are treated with the respect they deserve. NFDA has been at the forefront of this issue, advocating for reforms that protect grieving families from deception and abuse.” 

The bill grants the Department of Health and Human Services oversight of non-transplant tissue banks, requiring them to register, comply with informed consent protocols, and adhere to strict handling and tracking procedures. It also establishes penalties for violations, ensuring greater transparency and accountability. 

“Families should never have to question whether their loved one’s remains were handled with dignity,” said NFDA Senior Vice President, Advocacy, Lesley Witter, MPA, CAE. “The heartbreaking stories we’ve heard from families affected by bad actors underscore the urgency of passing this legislation. NFDA will continue to advocate tirelessly until these protections become law.” 

Funeral Coverage Act 

NFDA also supports the Funeral Coverage Act (H.R. 2436), introduced last week by Rep. Kevin Hern (R-OK), a forward-thinking bill that would help grieving families manage funeral costs by expanding how Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) can be used.  

The Funeral Coverage Act would classify funeral and burial expenses as qualified HSA expenses, allowing individuals to use tax-free HSA funds to help cover final arrangements. When HSA funds are used to pay for qualified medical expenses, those distributions are made on a tax-free basis. 

The current maximum amount that can be contributed to an HSA on an annual basis is $4,300 for an individual and $8,550 for a family. Like an IRA account, when a person sets up an HSA, they name a beneficiary. If the beneficiary is a surviving spouse, the unused portion of the decedent’s HSA passes directly to the spouse is added to his or her HSA and incurs no tax liability. 

However, the immediate need for the spouse is funds to cover a funeral and burial, rather than have excess funds automatically added to their own HSA. If the decedent died owing medical expenses, the proceeds in the HSA will be used to pay those medical expenses before funeral expenses are paid. 

According to NFDA research, only 26.4% of Americans aged 40 and older have preplanned and prepaid for their funeral expenses, leaving many unprepared when a death occurs. Expanding the use of HSA funds for funeral expenses provides families with greater financial flexibility and peace of mind. 

“For many families, funerals are an unexpected expense,” said Robinson. “This legislation is a compassionate step toward easing financial stress during one of life’s most difficult moments. NFDA is committed to ensuring that families have the resources they need to honor their loved ones without undue financial hardship.” 

Additional Legislation Supported by NFDA 

In addition to these critical bills, NFDA is actively advocating for passage of other legislation that impacts funeral service professionals and the families they serve. 

Ensuring Veterans’ Final Resting Place Act of 2025 (S. 1116/H.R. 647): This commonsense pro-veteran legislation would allow families to inter their veteran loved ones in a VA national cemetery even if they previously opted for an urn or plaque, ensuring families have flexibility to make the best decision for their loved one’s final resting place. This legislation provides a thoughtful solution to a problem that adds unnecessary stress and grief to veteran families. 

The Dennis and Lois Krisfalusy Act (H.R. 1344): This bill corrects an injustice by allowing the Department of Veteran Affairs to provide memorial headstones or markers for veterans, their spouses and dependent children, regardless of when they passed away, ensuring that military families are properly honored together. 

Prioritizing Veterans’ Survivors Act (H.R. 1228): The Office of Survivor Assistance (OSA) is a crucial resource overseeing all benefits and services furnished by VA to survivors and dependents of deceased Veterans. This bill would move the OSA from the Veterans Benefits Administration back to the Office of the VA Secretary, thus ensuring the OSA has direct access to the Secretary to fix policy and program-wide problems. 

Death Tax Repeal Act of 2025 (S. 587/H.R. 1301): Supported by more than 230 organizations, including NFDA, this bill seeks to repeal the estate and generation-skipping transfer taxes, which imposes an unfair and costly tax on the transfer of property, land and other assets from a deceased family member to heirs of family farms and small businesses, like funeral homes. 

No IRIS Act of 2025 (S. 623/H.R. 1415): This bipartisan bill seeks to reduce undue red tape imposed by the Environmental Protection Agency’s Integrated Risk Information System, ensuring that chemical risk assessments are based on sound science rather than political agendas. 

NFDA’s Commitment to Advocacy 

As the leading voice for funeral service professionals in Washington. D.C., NFDA tirelessly advocates for legislative and regulatory solutions that benefit funeral directors, their businesses and the funeral service profession. 

“Our active support of these bills exemplifies NFDA’s commitment to standing up for funeral service professionals and the grieving families they serve,” said Lesley Witter. “We urge Congress to swiftly pass this legislation to provide grieving families and funeral directors with the protections and support they deserve.” 

NFDA members will bring these key issues directly to Members of Congress during the upcoming NFDA Advocacy Summit, reinforcing the importance of legislative action to support both the funeral service profession and the families it serves. 

NFDA is the world’s leading and largest funeral service association, serving 20,000 individual members who represent nearly 11,000 funeral homes in the United States and 49 countries around the world. NFDA is the trusted leader, beacon for ethics and the strongest advocate for the profession.

NFDA is the association of choice because it offers funeral professionals comprehensive educational resources, tools to manage successful businesses, guidance to become pillars in their communities and the expertise to foster future generations of funeral professionals. NFDA is headquartered in Brookfield, Wis., and has an office in Washington, D.C. For more information, visit NFDA.org. 

Introducing Eulogize: The Simplest All-In-One Solution for Videos, Booklets, and More in Minutes

As more and more families expect highly personalized celebrations of life from deathcare providers, you and your team will spend more hours creating tailored memorial products like tribute videos, memorial folders, and other keepsakes. Unless, that is, you use Eulogize, an incredibly simple suite of creative tools that helps deathcare professionals produce unique and stunning tribute materials in minutes, not hours — and, perhaps most importantly, allows families to create their own incredible memorials with their Family self-service functionality. It also offers funeral homes the opportunity for infinite personalization, with features and freedoms that will garner endless compliments — and referrals.

Meet Eulogize

Eulogize is an all-in-one cloud-based platform that helps funeral teams create one-of-a-kind, personalized tributes with ease. Their current product suite can create tribute videos, TV welcome screens, memorial cards, funeral service folders, bookmarks, and thank-you notes, with more products launching regularly. Eulogize is truly user-friendly and doesn’t require funeral home staff to have any design expertise. “We are not a case management tool, a CRM or website provider,” explains Nick Kelly, Head of Product & Partnerships at Eulogize, “we don’t require anyone to change their existing systems; Eulogize works alongside your current platforms to both speed up and simplify the creation of beautiful tributes.”

After his mom struggled with the tribute creation process for his grandmother’s funeral service — choosing between restrictive and expensive in-house solutions or the daunting choice of creating it himself, co-founder Ben Sutton was inspired to build Eulogize Memorials in 2019.

So easy your mom could do it

Sutton knew there had to be a better, easier way for families to produce professional, personalized tributes for loved ones. Leveraging his years of experience with creative & digital technology, Sutton created Eulogize Memorials, initially launching the product to consumers. The product was an instant success because it was easy to use with no training and allowed for seamless collaboration among multiple family members and friends.

“We built this specifically for funerals from the beginning,” explains Sutton. “We’ve removed anything unnecessary, which allows us to create a far more streamlined and efficient platform and process.”

Creating a tribute with Eulogize is simple and doesn’t require dedicated devices, downloads or even any design experience. It’s also designed to be virtually error-proof, dynamically adjusting to whatever information the user enters. Text boxes automatically expand so everything fits and formats, warnings pop up when designs veer outside print margins, and video timelines automatically adapt to any number of slides or songs. Eulogize offers a theme-based workflow, with new themes added every month. This means the same design you use for a service folder easily translates to the slide show or memorial cards.

“It’s not just easy to make something good,” Sutton says, “but it’s really hard to make something bad. We always joke that we beta-test every new product with our moms, but it’s really not a joke. If they can’t use it the first time, we rebuild it.”

It didn’t take long for deathcare professionals to show interest in Eulogize. Kelly joined the team to create a version of the platform that would meet the specific needs of funeral home teams while keeping the simplicity that initial consumers loved. They roadtested the product by working alongside deathcare professionals in there home continent of Australia.

The result is a modern tribute creation platform that gives full control to funeral professionals and saves teams hours each week. With Eulogize, tributes are so quick and simple to create that you can create mock-ups with the family in the arrangement room faster than they can select a casket or flowers. The platform easily integrates with other deathcare technology. Information about the decedent and services flows into the program, saving time while drastically minimizing the potential for errors. The videos and digital versions of the stationery can then be hosted on the funeral home’s website or obits.

Only the features you need

Eulogize’s mission has always been to make lives easier, and that is demonstrated right through their business model.

“It’s not just the tributes you can personalize, it’s the whole platform,” Kelly explains. “You tell us what products you want to offer, what themes are available, what access the family should have, and even how and where or if you want to print.”

The team describes their platform as modular, where each funeral home can select which parts of the platform they wish to use to serve their communities best. “Some clients are only looking for a new video solution; others really like their video product but want something more modern for stationery. That’s great; we can create a unique platform for each funeral home with the features they need. The same goes for themes and backgrounds. We like working with each new client to create bespoke designs that will really connect with their communities”.

Within weeks of launching the professional version of Eulogize, the team started fielding inquiries from US-based funeral homes asking if the product could be used internationally. It posed a question for the young Eulogize team: focus on their own backyard or chase the much larger prize of the US market. “It was a big decision,” says Sutton. The risk was not just timezones and relocating but adapting the product to fit a new audience. “We decided to come over for one convention first and see what the local reaction was. It was better than we could have hoped for” Sutton finishes with a grin.

Sutton and Kelly introduced Eulogize to the U.S. in April at the 2024 International Cemetery, Cremation and Funeral Association Convention & Expo in Tampa. It only took one day at the convention for the team to realize they had made the right decision, immediately committing to the US expansion, booking in stands at CANA in Chicago, the NJFDA convention in Atlantic City, and the recent NFDA expo in New Orleans. “ICCFA was meant to be a soft launch, but the immediate reaction was so great that we knew we needed to immediately focus on bringing the product to the US” Kelly explains.

Connecting Directors’ Ryan Thogmartin was quick to recognize the potential of the platform and its usefulness right out of the box. Thogmartin introduced Eulogize with an interview with Sutton this spring.

Are family self-service tributes the future?

Recognizing the time limitations of deathcare professionals and the evolving consumer market, Sutton and Kelly created Eulogize to be a one-stop-shop solution that minimizes input but still produces the creative, individualized results that families expect.

“No one wants to say, ‘I want to put less time into a family’s memorials;’ that sounds awful,” Sutton says. “But we created a way for you to be incredibly efficient with your time and provide that absolute top level of personalization simultaneously. Our key thing is to make it more personal, make it more meaningful, but don’t make it take more time, and remove those stress points.”

One time-saving Eulogize feature is the ability for funeral directors to collaborate with families to create tributes if this is an option you’d like to offer.

“This has been one of the most popular features with funeral directors,” Kelly explains. “Giving families direct access cuts out a huge amount of back and forth, getting details, names or photo orders right and because the platform was originally designed direct to consumer, we know that it’s super easy for first-time users. Funeral homes that have lost large amounts of revenue due to the still rising rates of direct cremation have particularly liked this one, as they can’t justify a team member spending hours creating a video or program for these lower-cost options. Eulogize lets the funeral home sell access to our editor or include it in a package. This also means the funeral home can still benefit from the ability to host our videos on their obits or even sell custom branded photo albums and video books, which we can supply.”

In addition to eliminating email attachments, drop boxes, disks, and drives, using Eulogize offers families a truly indescribable and irreplaceable bonus: emotional relief.

“Grief experts have talked to us about the incredibly beneficial cathartic effect of the family spending time to go through these photos and tell stories to each other.”

Customize your Eulogize partnership today

Getting started on the Eulogize platform is simple and doesn’t incur any start-up costs. At this time, users can create six products through the Eulogize platform: tribute videos, TV welcome screens, memorial cards, order of service booklets, bookmarks, and thank-you notes. However, new and exciting print and video additions to this line-up are in the works that will create even more revenue-producing opportunities for deathcare providers. Sutton, Kelly and their team are always open to suggestions for enhancements or new options.

“Eulogize lets funeral businesses offer the unique personalization of an in-house graphic designer with the click of a single button,” Sutton adds. “The United States is such a huge place, and in a certain area, someone may say, ‘Hey, we do things a bit differently here.’ Those are the conversations we’re having, and we’re saying, ‘Fantastic! Tell us about what it is that you’d like for our technology to do for your families.”

Sutton and Kelly explain that partnering with Eulogize doesn’t require subscriptions, contracts, or commitments. “Plans are customized, with one base rate for printed suite projects and one for video suite projects but it’s only billed on generation. So if you start creating a tribute with a family and they decide not to go ahead, we don’t charge you”. This flexibility has helped with the platform’s rapidly growing popularity with clients big and small. “We have celebrant clients who may not make a tribute for a month because either it’s not their only job or the funeral home has taken care of it, but we are there when they need us.”

Like the tribute products you will create with the Eulogize platform, your partnership with Eulogize will be personalized based on your needs and wants.

“You tell us what your families are looking for, and what your business is looking for, and we’ll create a custom version of our product — a package for you that’s going to work best for your families, that’s going to fit seamlessly into your staff and their current workflows. It’s not going to be disruptive. You’ll be able to turn it on and use it pretty much the next day, and it’s going to run and give you the best opportunity and best chance to serve both your families and your business as we move through 2024 and beyond.”

Reach out to Ben Sutton, Nick Kelly, and the Eulogize team today for a zero-obligation demo via email partnerships@eulogizememorials.com or call 1-800-947-9064. You can also complete a contact form online at https://eulogizememorials.com/funeral-professionals.