Cremation Association of North America Grows Staff to Support Strategic Plan

Promotion and New Hire Reflect Expansion of CANA’s Content and Membership Initiatives

WHEELING, IL— It’s a time of growth and innovation for the Cremation Association of North America (CANA). Widening its focus to help member businesses recruit and retain a vibrant, diverse, and well-trained workforce and educate and best serve their families, CANA continues to promote best practices in cremation through education, innovation, and collaboration.

A growing membership and an emphasis on aligning content strategy with CANA’s mission and values has resulted in new and reorganized staff responsibilities. CANA Board President Lindsey Ballard praises these appointments and invites you to offer “Congratulations to Brie Bingham and Sara Corkery in their new roles and welcome Kenjuana Hall to CANA! Brie and Sara have brought decades of experience to CANA, increasing our reputation and shaping CANA’s voice. Kenjuana will bring fresh eyes to membership initiatives in the newly created role of Membership and Operations Manager. “

BRIE BINGHAM PROMOTED TO SENIOR CONTENT MANAGER

After more than a decade of service at the Cremation Association of North America (CANA), Brie Bingham (pictured above, right) has been promoted to the newly established role of Senior Content Manager. This strategic position reflects CANA’s commitment to delivering high-quality, engaging, and educational and research content to its members and the broader death care community.

Brie has held progressive roles in membership and marketing with CANA for over a decade, bringing a dynamic blend of creativity, strategic thinking, and deep industry knowledge to her work. In her new role, Brie will lead the development and implementation of CANA’s communications, research, and educational content strategies. She will oversee the production of the association’s publications and guide the association’s online presence. Brie will also support CANA’s research projects education programs and strategic goals through content development, project management, and digital platform oversight.

Barbara Kemmis, Executive Director of CANA, shares her enthusiasm for the promotion: “Brie’s promotion to Senior Content Manager is well deserved. Her ability to craft compelling content and build meaningful connections with our members has already transformed how we engage with our community. Brie has grown both revenue and CANA’s reputation through marketing efforts, so this promotion is recognition of those skills and the importance of content to CANA’s strategic growth. CANA is a thought leader in the profession and Brie’s new role will increase the focus on content creation through research, publications and education. I am thrilled to see her take on these expanded responsibilities and continue shaping the future of our association.”

Brie will continue to collaborate closely with Sara Corkery (pictured above, left), who remains a vital part of CANA’s communications team. With more than thirteen years of experience leading CANA’s magazine and collateral, Sara continues in her role as Managing Editor of The Cremationist and as Editor and Graphic Designer for CANA’s print and digital materials.

KENJUANA HALL, HIRED AS MEMBERSHIP AND OPERATIONS MANAGER

The Cremation Association of North America (CANA) is pleased to announce the appointment of Kenjuana Hall (pictured above, middle) as its new Membership and Operations Manager, a key leadership role focused on enhancing member engagement, operational excellence, and strategic support across the organization.

Kenjuana brings over a decade of experience in membership management, data governance, and nonprofit operations. Most recently, she served as Database & Membership Manager at the Society of Gynecologic Oncology, where her work guided leadership decisions, streamlined workflows, and ensured data integrity and member satisfaction for more than 3,000 members.

In her new role at CANA, Kenjuana will lead membership retention and recruitment strategies, manage member benefit programs, support volunteer and governance structures, and oversee the association management system which supports CANA’s newest member benefit, CANA Connect, a discussion forum for CANA members to share information and access member benefits. She will also play a pivotal role in operational coordination and cross-functional initiatives aligned with CANA’s strategic plan.

Barbara Kemmis is eager to work with CANA’s newest employee: “Kenjuana Hall brings a rare combination of technical expertise, strategic insight, and a deep commitment to member service. Her experience in data-driven decision-making and operational leadership will be invaluable as CANA continues to grow and evolve. We are thrilled to welcome her to our team and look forward to the impact she will make.”

CANA celebrates our existing and new staff members dedicated to advancing the association’s mission and enhancing the experience of its members.

About CANA

Founded in 1913, the Cremation Association of North America (CANA) is an international organization of over 3,700 members, composed of funeral homes, cemeteries, crematories, industry suppliers, and consultants. CANA members believe that cremation is preparation for memorialization.

When I was operating my funeral home most of my energy went to taking care of the families I was serving, taking care of the staff I was leading, and taking care of the budget I was trying to meet.  Doing all of that didn’t always leave enough time to thoroughly look after the adminsitrative and regulatory burdens that needed attention from time to time.

As an owner of a funeral home and/or cemetery you have a fiduciary responsibility to those who deposit preneed funeral money, preneed cemetery merchandise money, and/or cemetery perpetual care money into your care.  You must acknowledge that responsibility and stay on top of the regulations, guidelines, and investment returns so that those funds deliver what they were intended for over time.

Sometimes that is difficult for funeral home or cemetery owners and/or directors to do simply because we are not schooled or trained in that environment. Most of those funeral home or cemetery operators also don’t have the extra time to pay detailed attention to all of those necessary issues. . . . .And, even if they do, most don’t have the expertise that is needed to operate those trust services in a fully competent and regulatory manner.

That’s where Regions Bank may come to help your business.  Regions Bank, as you can see from this explanation and video of their “Funeral Home and Cemetery Trust Services”, is one of the very few full-service financial institutions in the country to have a dedicated division serving the needs of funeral homes and cemeteries.

According to their website, Regions Bank operates in 37 states of the United States and is a national leader for “Funeral and Cemetery Trust Services”.  They operate in the following fields:

• Preneed Trusts
• Cemetery Merchandise Trusts
• Perpetual Care Trusts
• Pre-Construction Trusts

And, while you are busy operating your business on a day-to-day situation, Regions Bank will watch over your trust’s investment, legal, and administration situations.  From my perspective it may be the best way to make sure that your funeral home, cemetery, cemetery association, or other Death Care operation stays up to date with the fiduciary and regulatory responsibilities that is owed future clients.

Fow more information and who to contact at Regions Bank you can click here.

More news from the world of Death Care:

Funeral director discusses rising costs.  The New Zealand Herald (New Zealand)

“We count on people who care about the cemetery”.  The Sentinal (MN)

North Kingstown family helping to redifine funeral care for south county residents.  The Independent (RI)

Death Care sector faces dynamic shifts with new innovations.  Cointurk Finance

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

We received an e-mail last week that announced “Pinnacle Funeral Service and Rollings Funeral Service are proud to announce that Nancy Weil has joined the team as Director of Community Outreach. . . . .Nancy’s career includes serving as the Membership Director for the Order of the Golden Rule (OGR) for the past six years, where she worked closely with funeral homes across the country to promote excellence in service. She is a Certified Grief Management Specialist, Grief Services Provider, and Funeral Celebrant, facilitating virtual grief support groups and providing training to help funeral professionals better serve their communities.”

The announcement also said this about the companies, “Rollings and Pinnacle Funeral Service groups partnered early last year so they could both provide better support for their locations and provide more opportunities for their team members.”  And, you will notice that if you look at the current websites for both companies that Mr. Tony Kumming is listed as the President of both firms.

There is nothing unusual about that arrangement in business, but on a bigger scale, I think it shows that what might have been known in our business as regional consolidators or operating funeral home companies are beginning to scale for more growth. . . . and, I don’t think Rollings and/or Pinnacle are unique in that situation.

We’ve recently written about what Funeral Director Daily sees growing in our business.  That is, anecdotally, we seem to see more announcements about acquisitions of family owned funeral homes in the media than we have seen before.   With the larger publicly-owned funeral home companies we usually receive an e-mail press release about any acquisition, but in the smaller and non-public company arena those acquisitions are usually kept as silent as possible.

Tom Anderson
Funeral Director Daily

That also is not unusual. . . public companies need to let their shareholders know of the growth whereas smaller private operators try to cause as few waves with potential consumers about a change in ownership in local trade areas.  However, that quiet is balanced with a former owner wanting his friends and neighbors to know of the ownership change. . . . thus, local announcements in local newspapers that Funeral Director Daily scours for this information.

In my opinion, seeing these annoucements more frequently is more proof of what most of us believe is coming to the profession.  That is less family ownership over time as new generations of funeral home descendents choose to enter other lines of work.

A positive aspect of all of these companies seemingly ramping up for acquisitions is that sellers of funeral businesses have more and more options of whom they may want to trust their businesses to in the future.  In addition to the national and regional companies we have listed below, most local funeral home owners know of going-concern businesses in their vicinity that may also want to acquire certain funeral homes. . . . . . At the end of the day for those funeral home owners planning on dis-engaging from the business this seems to give them more options in choice, and possible price.

While not an exhaustive group, here are some of the North American non-public fuenral/cremation/cemetery company operators that we know of:

More news from the world of Death Care:

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

It’s the middle of the month and time to re-cap the Most Read Stories of the past 30 days on Funeral Director Daily.  Funeral Director Daily tries to publish a variety of information, news, and opinions with a wide variety of Death Care interests.  It looks like we succeeded in the past 30 days as we have news about Experiential sales channels from Service Corporation International and Batesville. . . . we have information on new products introduced. .  . we have information about staff changes at a large Death Care technology firm. . . .and, we have a report from the floor of the recent NFDA Convention in New Orleans.

If you missed any of these Top Read articles — here’s a chance to catch up on what you missed. . .

1. SCI opens “First-of-its-kind” mausoleum
2. CEO Charlie Cole, two other executives leave Tribute Technology
3. Observations from the “Big Easy”
4. Batesville to introduce their “Showroom of the Future” at NFDA
5. Will Cumulus become the standard in digital memorials?

So, there you have it.  Make sure that you catch up on these articles and if you don’t want to miss any more make sure you make use of the space below and sign up for Funeral Director Daily’s “Daily E-mail blast” with our article of the day delivered directly to your inbox.

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

I received an unsolicited e-mail the other day about taking a course that would lead me to become a “Certified Funeral Celebrant”.  I’m not interested in that but, more and more, I see greater numbers of the consumer public shedding the idea of using formal clergy in the memorialization of their loved ones.

And, as I was thinking about the thought of funerals, memorial services, and out-of-the-norm death care services, I started to think that “Funeral Celebrants” are in more and more demand everyday.  The crux of my service as a funeral director was from 1980 thru 2013, which is now ten years ago.

Even in my time the trend was for increasing numbers of families that questioned how, or who, since they have no church membership, would “officiate” at the funeral of their loved one.  Luckily our funeral home was in a large retirement area and we had several retired clergy around who appreciated the chance to “spread the gospel” to families who had either “fallen away” from the church or never joined a church.  Most of these retired clergy relished the chance to have an audience where they could spread the good news of the gospels once again.

And, most families appreciated those thoughts and the message that was delivered.  But today, as you can see from the small graph below, the decline of church membership continues in this country and I’m of the belief that more and more mourners now prefer a “secular” officiant over a “religious” officiant at a death care service.

In researching this article I found this information from SCI’s Dignity Memorial branch giving consumer information on a “Funeral Celebrant”.  Just by having it available for consumer information on their website gives some indication of the growing popularity of the idea.  Here’s is what they say about why you might want to use a celebrant:

• You need help personalizing a funeral service and you’re not sure how to do it.
• You want someone who is more flexible and experienced than a traditional minister to guide the service.
• You are looking for someone to act as an officiant and as the main speaker at a memorial.

In my lifetime I’ve also seen a movement whereby American citizens more often than not look for answers from an “expert” than dig deep inside themselves to find their own answers to questions that they may have.  I’ve even moved that way — for instance looking at a YouTube video on fixing my lawn mower instead of just getting out there with my tool set and going at it.

On this website titled “The Ultimate guide to a Celebrant-Led funeral” I can see why many would look to a celebrant for guidance on something that they are not familiar with.  The website states this, as to how a celebrant will help, among other things:

• Be a point of support and guidance from the very first meeting right through until the end of the service

Tom Anderson
Funeral Director Daily

Funeral Director Daily take:  The one obstacle I see from the funeral home’s point of view is that I think it may be difficult for mourning family members to separate the guidance that they get from a funeral celebrant from the guidance that they get from the funeral director during the death care process.  From my point of view the jobs of the two are distinct and different — but I’m not so sure that every family will recognize that.

Because of that I think it is probably best that the funeral home have an incredible working relationship with the celebrant, or better yet, have a celebrant on staff for the families that they serve.

I think celebrants will be used more and more going forward and because of that I would suggest having funeral directors who are interested in being out front and not intimidated by being a speaker and leader of a service look into celebrant training.  By doing so a funeral home can be assured that its philosophy for guiding a family from grief through memorialization to remembrance is not intercepted by someone with a differing philosophy.

I’d go as far to say that having celebrants on staff and the care that they give as a celebrant can be a seamless “continuity of care” to the family from the funeral home.  That continuity on how a family can be cared for by, in order, a funeral director, a celebrant, and an aftercare program could be a difference maker in many consumer choices for funeral home selection. . . . . .especially when there is no organized church and/or clergy involved.

If I was still operating my funeral home and I had not done so yet, I would look for ways in which I could present secular celebrants to families . . . . . . just the offer and opportunity may move families from a simple direct cremation with no services to a more thorough memorialization with ancillary services.

More news from the world of Death Care:

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