Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the short Stuff on Josh and
Speaker 1: there's Chuck and this is short stuff. Uh, this is
Speaker 1: another funeral edition one um, the never Ending Death Suite,
Speaker 1: I guess is what it's a part of. I know,
Speaker 1: and I just want funeral directors out there who listen
Speaker 1: to know that we don't not like you. Uh, just
Speaker 1: because this episode is going to be called the casket Racket,
Speaker 1: it doesn't mean we don't like you. But when you
Speaker 1: look at the numbers of the price of caskets, the
Speaker 1: markup on caskets, it is a little hard to not
Speaker 1: think there's got to be a better way. Yeah, a
Speaker 1: more fair, humane way that doesn't just completely rip off
Speaker 1: the consumer. Okay, So um, I think the average casket
Speaker 1: in the United States goes for about bucks, which is
Speaker 1: a significant contributor to the overall costs of a funeral,
Speaker 1: which can be eight to ten grand on average. That's
Speaker 1: like a quarter or more of the total cost, just
Speaker 1: as in the casket alone. Um. And apparently that prices
Speaker 1: increased dramatically, Chuck, like two fifty increase over the last
Speaker 1: thirty years, So you would think, like, okay, that means
Speaker 1: that like the the casket making guild has has broken up,
Speaker 1: and like they're they're not passing along their knowledge any longer.
Speaker 1: The stuff that they used to make caskets have become
Speaker 1: so rare that they we can hardly get our hands
Speaker 1: out anymore. What else could could qualify caskets for a
Speaker 1: two hundred and fifty increase uh in in price over
Speaker 1: the years, which by the way, is twice as much
Speaker 1: the inflation rate as the next highest item has has
Speaker 1: grown in price over the last thirty years. So what
Speaker 1: is it about caskets that has has made them grow
Speaker 1: in price so much? Chuck? Well, I mean things that contribute. Certainly,
Speaker 1: if you're just shopping for a casket, uh and this
Speaker 1: isn't necessarily inflation, but if you're if you're wondering how
Speaker 1: you spend you know, six grand on a casket. It's
Speaker 1: a piece of it's not furniture, but like it's made
Speaker 1: out of wood. If you want a wood when they're
Speaker 1: also metal, ones will get into both. But if you're
Speaker 1: looking at something made out of wood, obviously the materials
Speaker 1: is going to be a big deal. So if you
Speaker 1: want the mahogany or the hickory or the walnut casket,
Speaker 1: it's going to cost a lot more than like the
Speaker 1: Pine box or the oak box. Uh. If you're looking
Speaker 1: at metal, the pricey ones are twenty gauge steel, and
Speaker 1: you know you can also get copper or bronze and
Speaker 1: stuff like that. I think the least pricey ones are
Speaker 1: the twenty gauge steel, Like that's their Pine box version
Speaker 1: for metal ones. Oh did I say most expensive? I
Speaker 1: think I'm at least expensive. Sorry about that. Obviously the
Speaker 1: copper and the bronze are gonna be the pricest ones.
Speaker 1: But you know, then there's craftsmanship with any kind of um,
Speaker 1: anything made by human hands. If it's got you know,
Speaker 1: fancier stuff on it, it's gonna cost a lot more.
Speaker 1: If the corners are all rounded instead of welded off,
Speaker 1: it's going to be a lot more. So all these
Speaker 1: things go into determining the price. But uh, and of
Speaker 1: course what's going on in the inside as well, all
Speaker 1: the all the fancy silks and and almost said bunting,
Speaker 1: but like that crape interior um is gonna be less
Speaker 1: expensive than velvet. So inside and out, the materials matter,
Speaker 1: the craftsmanship matters. But and maybe we should well know,
Speaker 1: let's go ahead say it before the break. What's really
Speaker 1: going on is there are two main casket manufacturers in
Speaker 1: the u S. Batesville and Matthews. They have not a monopoly,
Speaker 1: but about a two percent share of the distribution. It's
Speaker 1: pretty close. And they don't sell the people. They sell
Speaker 1: only to funeral homes, so they mark it up by
Speaker 1: three or four and then the funeral directors can then
Speaker 1: mark it up as well. So that's where the money's
Speaker 1: really going, yes, through the markup, because they have almost
Speaker 1: a monopoly. So I say that we take that break
Speaker 1: you're talking about, maybe lion repose for a couple of minutes,
Speaker 1: and we will come back and get active again. It
Speaker 1: sounds good, so Chuck Um. One of the reasons why
Speaker 1: the two main manufacturers of caskets can mark their prices
Speaker 1: up as because they sell directly to funeral homes, and
Speaker 1: the reason that funeral directors can further mark those up
Speaker 1: to whatever they want. It's because most people don't shop
Speaker 1: around for not only a casket, but a funeral home.
Speaker 1: They probably went to a funeral at the funeral home
Speaker 1: they're using before. Maybe they've used that funeral home before
Speaker 1: and their repeat, repeat customer. I would guess that unless
Speaker 1: you have a really bad experience with a funeral home,
Speaker 1: you're probably going to use the same one over and
Speaker 1: over again because you're in the depths of grief and
Speaker 1: you're not thinking about your bottom line or your pocketbook.
Speaker 1: You're just trying to get through this terrible time. And
Speaker 1: funeral directors know that, and they price their prices accordingly
Speaker 1: because they have a captive customer. That's right. There's probably
Speaker 1: one family member he's really wanting to shop around, Uncle Sal,
Speaker 1: but Uncle Stal gets shut down, usually by the other
Speaker 1: family members who talk about this is not the time
Speaker 1: to cheap out. So he just loudly complains throughout the
Speaker 1: he's that's right. A lot of paroled eyes, a lot
Speaker 1: of harrumph, Oh here we go again. How much is
Speaker 1: this guest book gonna cost? But you're right, most people
Speaker 1: go to the same place and they know they got
Speaker 1: you there. Uh. By the way, quick aside, the funeral home,
Speaker 1: which I've talked about a lot across the street from me,
Speaker 1: they were shooting a movie there yesterday. Oh really, what movie?
Speaker 1: I don't know, but they changed the funeral sign. So
Speaker 1: if you ever see a movie with a gold horse
Speaker 1: and F and G funeral home that's across the street
Speaker 1: from my house. You know, just based on probabilities, there's
Speaker 1: like a fort chance it was a Marvel movie. Uh
Speaker 1: sure here in Atlanta. You're right, yeah, because it's a movie, right,
Speaker 1: exactly right, all right, so they got you in there.
Speaker 1: They know they can mark it up. But there are
Speaker 1: online casket retailers now who are who have had enough.
Speaker 1: They say we want more than an eighteen percent market
Speaker 1: share because we're going direct to customer. We are selling
Speaker 1: them cheaper. In some cases you can save you know,
Speaker 1: seven fred bucks on the casket alone, and some of
Speaker 1: them deliver overnight. The other ones have them to you
Speaker 1: in like a few days. And they're like, this is
Speaker 1: an outdated model that we're using where these you know,
Speaker 1: we need to move on from this two manufacturers and
Speaker 1: uh and move into the modern age where you can
Speaker 1: buy this thing on Amazon or at Costco. Right, which
Speaker 1: is smart and it makes sense. And if you give
Speaker 1: any kind of thought to this, or if you'll listen
Speaker 1: to your uncle Sal, and your uncle Sal has happens
Speaker 1: to be tech savvy and knows to go on to
Speaker 1: Amazon to order a casket. You can order one of
Speaker 1: these caskets and save hundreds, potentially thousands of dollars UM
Speaker 1: and get pretty much the same casket that you would
Speaker 1: get from the funeral director. And time was up until
Speaker 1: not that long ago, that the funeral director would say, sorry,
Speaker 1: we don't deal in third party caskets. We only uh,
Speaker 1: we were only able to supply our own caskets, so
Speaker 1: it's are the only ones we use. And that was
Speaker 1: what they did. They blocked caskets that were purchased outside
Speaker 1: um and you had no choice but to buy your
Speaker 1: casket through the funeral home you were using until get this,
Speaker 1: until the federal government stepped in and said, funeral industry,
Speaker 1: you've gotten so bad and so predatory that we, the
Speaker 1: Federal Trade Commission, are going to enact what's called the
Speaker 1: Funeral Rule, and we're going to set up a bunch
Speaker 1: of rules that govern how you conduct your business because
Speaker 1: you have shown that you can't be trusted to conduct
Speaker 1: your business fairly otherwise. And one of them is that
Speaker 1: you have to accept third party caskets. Yeah, and you
Speaker 1: know that's why it's called the casket racket. That's why
Speaker 1: this episode is titled that, because it was a racket
Speaker 1: up until then. The only reason I'm gonna say it's
Speaker 1: not a racket anymore. Is because of that funeral rule
Speaker 1: where they do have to accept a third party casket.
Speaker 1: But there's still as of two thousand nineteen of casket
Speaker 1: are still purchased through those main manufacturers. Like that's still
Speaker 1: going on. I think much of that is because people
Speaker 1: just don't know that there is that funeral rule and
Speaker 1: that there are other options. Yeah, and the next time
Speaker 1: that somebody complains to you about big government, you tell
Speaker 1: them about the funeral rule and tell them to go
Speaker 1: think about that. Uh, you can get free shipping with
Speaker 1: some of these, like I said, you can many times
Speaker 1: get them overnighted or there in a few days, and
Speaker 1: you can save a lot of money. And like this
Speaker 1: sounds like we're on a soapbox, but it's just it's
Speaker 1: a bad time when you're bearing a loved one and
Speaker 1: it's already expensive. So if we can impart a little
Speaker 1: wisdom and you can save you know, a couple of
Speaker 1: grand Like, I think we're doing a service here. I
Speaker 1: agree wholeheartedly. Um and I think Chuck, we should do
Speaker 1: an entire episode on the funeral rule. It's pretty it's
Speaker 1: much more expansive than just making funeral directors, except third
Speaker 1: party caskets. There's a lot more to it. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: surprised we didn't cover that in any of our anti
Speaker 1: funeral Yeah. And also we've done an entire episode on caskets,
Speaker 1: if I'm not mistaken. Remember, Ghana has this awesome tradition
Speaker 1: of making these super style and cool caskets. So if
Speaker 1: you have some time to kill right now, go online
Speaker 1: and do an image search of Ghana caskets and you
Speaker 1: will be impressed. That's right. And we also did one
Speaker 1: on cremation and the latest numbers. I think we did
Speaker 1: this back then, but just to keep everyone updated. Numbers
Speaker 1: by the n f d A, the National Funeral Director's
Speaker 1: Association say that the cremation rate now in America is
Speaker 1: projected to be fifty eight percent and there projecting that
Speaker 1: out in to drop down to twenty five of burial,
Speaker 1: so se cremation. Yeah, I don't know that that's going
Speaker 1: to have an effect on caskets because people who are
Speaker 1: cremated still often have like viewings and showings and check
Speaker 1: them outs and all that stuff. You still gonna need
Speaker 1: to keep poke it for it. So I don't know
Speaker 1: that that will affect things. But you know, there you go.
Speaker 1: That's a great way to is Yeah, since everything just
Speaker 1: petered out yet again, that means the short stuff everybody
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