How to open funeral services. How to open funeral services from scratch

Life is such that mortality in any case reaches 100%, that is, all people are mortal. And the last farewell to the deceased is also an important moment for relatives and loved ones. But organizing a funeral is a troublesome matter, which, due to its specifics, needs to be prepared in a short time. Therefore, people often turn to funeral service bureaus that professionally organize funerals.

One way or another, the services of a funeral home will always be needed. However, this business is unique not only because “the customer is always dead,” but also because of the enormous competition, including utility companies and government agencies. Although at first glance, a funeral is a procedure that does not tolerate pomp. In practice, clients sometimes look for such non-standard services as making some kind of product from the ashes of the deceased, or saying goodbye in an unusual place, or burial at the bottom of the ocean, special musical accompaniment, etc.

Before we begin

To organize this business, you need to carefully determine the list of services. It depends on what category of the population will use your services. Middle-class clients, as a rule, order partial funeral provision, for example, only a coffin, wreaths, hearse, and less often use a complex of services or a turnkey funeral.

Competition in this segment is very high, especially after the abolition of licensing activities. In addition, the high cost of burial itself in cities does not allow achieving a high level of profitability - within 15-20% with the average cost of a funeral being 15 thousand rubles. There is a slightly higher profitability of the production of paraphernalia - within 40%, so it is worth considering the possibility of producing coffins, wreaths, tombstones, etc.

If you do not intend to manufacture paraphernalia yourself, then analyze the prices and conditions of suppliers. Secondly, make a list of catering places of different price categories with which you can cooperate when organizing a funeral. Find several companies or individuals offering hearse and private transportation services. In addition, think about whether you have access to the administration of hospitals or morgues, as well as representatives of municipalities, from whom you will receive information about the deceased. But remember that this is illegal and will require considerable expenses from you.

Main risks: this business can only develop if it focuses on the “average bill” client with a cost of 20-60 thousand rubles. If the majority of orders are from the lower segment, and the range of services is minimal, amounting to no more than 15 thousand rubles, then it will be difficult to stay afloat. This is a market with a large number of players and fairly low profitability. Development requires business diversification, the presence of own production and wide “unofficial” connections among medical personnel and social services.

“How to start your own funeral services business”

Location

Its location plays a significant role in the profitability of a funeral service bureau. If this is a small town, then it is better to locate the funeral home in the center; in large cities, premises close to hospitals and morgues, as well as cemeteries, are suitable. The area of ​​the premises depends on the list of services provided: if you are only engaged in the sale of paraphernalia, then one showroom is enough; for a full-fledged funeral bureau, you also need a farewell hall for the deceased, rooms for preparing the body for burial. In total, you need to calculate at least 200 m2.

When choosing a room, you must be guided by SanPin standards, according to which the placement of a farewell hall for the deceased is strictly prohibited in residential buildings, and even a bureau with funeral goods must be located at least 50 m2 from residential buildings, as well as medical institutions, and any public places ( schools, kindergartens, sports clubs, cultural institutions, etc.

For an expanded funeral services bureau, it is necessary to provide parking for hearses and buses, and production premises. By the way, to make paraphernalia, you can rent premises on the outskirts of the city, as well as use home labor.

Equipment

The simplest funeral service bureau, which deals only with the sale of paraphernalia, requires practically no equipment, only small investments in repairs (as a rule, they are not pompous). But in addition, your company can provide the following services:

• carrying out funeral rites, digging graves.
• production and sale of coffins, tombstones, wreaths, photos and other related products.
• organization of funeral dinner, orchestra and transportation.

In addition, the list of services is expanding with cremation, embalming, preparing the body for burial, etc.

To produce coffins, it is necessary to organize a carpentry workshop with all the necessary tools. Ensure in advance an uninterrupted supply of materials: wood and consumables, packaging. To make metal coffins you will need a punching press, a grinding machine, a welding and stamping machine.

The production of tombstones, in addition to consumables (granite chips, crushed stone, sand, expanded clay), involves the purchase of quite expensive equipment. It’s easy to make a photo for the monument yourself; all you need is a computer and a printer.

To produce wreaths, it is necessary to purchase a cutting machine, a winding machine, irons and hand tools, and the supply of materials for artificial flowers is also necessary.

One of the prestigious equipment for funeral homes is the singhumator. This is an automatic device that allows you to lower the coffin into the grave without human assistance. Such a device will favorably distinguish your company from competitors.

Personnel

The main personnel for your bureau are account managers. They are the ones who make up the image of your company. Education in this case is practically unimportant, the main thing is that he is a sensitive person, sensitive to psychology. However, he must be able to quickly respond to the client's requirements and provide him with the services he expects to receive.

It is also necessary to include a lawyer on staff, or involve a third-party specialist. His responsibilities will include issuing death certificates, obtaining burial permits and, if necessary, resolving disputes.

For production, it is necessary to hire specialists of various profiles: carpenters, turners, general workers. Transport drivers can be hired from outside if your funeral home does not have its own fleet of vehicles.

Documents and licenses

As mentioned above, this activity is currently not licensed. However, you need to register your activities by opening a limited liability company. In this type of activity, legal custom is the legal basis for regulating the list of services provided by a funeral agency.

According to the law, in order to ensure that the state covers part of the burial costs, the funeral organization must enter into an appropriate written agreement with the customer. For this purpose, only standard forms are used, on all sides of which the funeral agency’s seal is affixed. It is necessary to distinguish between an invoice order for a funeral and an agreement for the provision of funeral services.

Marketing

Advertising activities in the funeral business are very specific. First of all, it should be as tactful and unobtrusive as possible. But even if you post advertisements or send direct mail, the nature of people is such that they will not remember any funeral home when there is no need for it. Therefore, in this market, a norm has been formed to intercept information about the deceased and notify about their services at the most difficult moment for relatives. Let us emphasize once again that providing such data is an official crime, and the entrepreneur may face punishment.

Therefore, your prestige and the level of previously provided services work in this business. If you did your job honestly, people, after analyzing it later, realized that your agency did not “cheat” on their grief, they will definitely recommend your services to their friends in difficult times.

Summary

It is necessary to open a funeral service bureau either in a segment that is not yet occupied in your local market or in a place not covered by these services. High competition will not allow you to quickly make a profit, but after strengthening your image, you are guaranteed a stable income of 20-30%. Initial investments range from 10 thousand dollars, if you just start selling funeral paraphernalia, to 100 thousand when organizing an expanded business with your own production and a wide range of services.

Unfortunately, neither scientists nor nature have yet created an elixir that allows you to live forever. Sooner or later a person dies, and this is a completely natural phenomenon. In such a situation, the first actions of the relatives of the deceased are to organize a burial ritual and do this as soon as possible at the highest level. In such cases, services to assist in conducting the burial ceremony are in demand. The business of opening a funeral service bureau can generate substantial amounts of income.

You shouldn’t think that making money on someone else’s grief is a way out of the situation. After all, the relatives of the deceased would feel much worse if there were no services. If you are not put into a stupor by the gloomy atmosphere of this type of income, and the main goal is real help to people, then you should consider a business plan for a funeral home.

The funeral business is always in demand and relevant

What you need to open a funeral business

In order to open a professional and good agency providing funeral services, you will need to pay attention to several aspects:

• choosing office space;
• definition with warehouse;
• search for qualified employees;
• legal assistance;
• funds for business advertising;
• agreement with suppliers;
• agreement with the cemetery administration;
• sale of all paraphernalia - wreaths, coffins, as well as hiring people to dig the grave;
• concerns about the allocation of land.

from the very beginning, immediately after deciding to open such a business, you need to decide on the full list of services that you are going to provide.

If you have decent starting capital, this list of services can easily be supplemented with some others - for example, making custom coffins, making monuments, crosses. Services for body embalming, cremation, religious ceremonies, and so on. Despite the vastness of the goods and services offered, it is necessary to remember the current competitive conditions available on the market.

Room

The choice of premises - and, as we have already said, there should be enough of them to carry out the activity. First, care must be taken to open a warehouse to store goods, a room for a small morgue and to house the equipment used for processing bodies. Secondly, you need to make sure that there is a waiting room on your premises for the loved ones of the deceased. All this will require an area of ​​at least 200 square meters. m. The adjacent area should also include parking for buses and hearses.

Funeral services are always in demand, especially in large populated areas. The funeral business is distinguished not only by stability, but also by a vast field of activity, the ability to start work with relatively small capital and good profitability. However, with a careless approach, entrepreneurs face significant difficulties, so it is important to develop a detailed plan for the implementation of the project and take into account what will have to be dealt with in the process of organization and development. The features of the funeral service system and where to start a funeral business are discussed later in the article.

Specifics of the funeral business

Before opening a funeral service bureau, you need to familiarize yourself with the important features of this field of activity. Since in the process of work the organizer will have to deal not only with the deceased, but also with relatives and friends who, for obvious reasons, may be in a state of shock and experience grief, it is necessary to always remember delicacy and not apply pressure.

The most profitable business will be one that includes comprehensive funeral arrangements. In other words, clients contacting a funeral bureau must receive a full range of services, and the company must offer not only the appropriate goods, but also transport for transporting the coffin and body, legal support, organization of the funeral process, burial, wake and other services.

Funeral services are an area in which competition is well developed, therefore, in order to carve out a niche in the business, it makes sense to offer not only standard, but also original services: from making urns of unusual shapes to organizing a ritual burial for pets.

The greatest profits in such a business are made by companies that take care of their reputation in the first place.

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Registration of activities

To get started, you need to register funeral services as a business with the tax service. The suitable legal form for enterprises carrying out such activities is an individual entrepreneur (IP) or a limited liability company (LLC). It is useful to read about.

According to the latest edition of the OKVED classifier, the code suitable for the provision of funeral services is 96.03 - “Organization of funerals and the provision of related services.” It is this that must be entered in the column of the registration application intended for the code of the type of main activity of the enterprise (see).

In addition to registering an enterprise and choosing a method of paying taxes, you will need to obtain permits (conclusions on the compliance of working conditions with sanitary and fire safety requirements) from local authorities of Rospotrebnadzor and the fire service. This will be enough to start doing business.

Activities

Among the services that a funeral agency can provide, the most popular are the following:

• comprehensive organization of the funeral process, starting from preparing the deceased and ending with the installation of monuments and tombstones;
• selection and design of a burial site;
• earthworks (digging a grave, burying after burial, preparing the soil for installing a fence and monument);
• production or purchase and subsequent sale of goods for organizing funerals. This includes coffins (see), monuments, fences, steles, crosses, wreaths, candles and other products;
• organization of transportation of the deceased and transportation of mourners and relatives to visit a church, cemetery, place of funeral;
• preparation of the deceased (make-up, selection of funeral clothes, sanitary treatment and other services).

An important point in organizing a funeral services business is finding clients. It will be necessary to organize a competent advertising campaign so that the emergence of a new company becomes known on the market: both printed media (flyers, banners, leaflets, etc.) and online sources (development of a company website, announcements on relevant forums, maintaining a page) will be suitable in social networks). It is advisable that clients be able to familiarize themselves with product samples if the bureau specializes in the production of coffins, monuments, wreaths and other products.

Other ways to find clients: “word of mouth”, in which clients recommend the company’s services to their friends or relatives, and cooperation with representatives of organizations directly related to the support and registration of the deceased (internal affairs officers, morgues).

Funeral service bureau work plan

Organization of the enterprise's work is carried out in several stages. Before you open a funeral business, you should draw up a commercial plan. It is necessary to take into account the size of one-time and subsequent expenses, the amount of work and other factors. The least starting capital will be required if the agency is engaged in the sale of finished products and provision of services: in this case, you will need to take into account the cost of purchased goods. If the bureau itself begins to produce goods for funerals, it will be necessary to calculate the price taking into account the costs of materials, labor, and wear and tear of equipment.

Premises and equipment

The next stage is searching for premises and purchasing equipment. Minimum requirements for the room: area 40-60 square meters, good traffic, preferably the predominance of dark colors in the interior and the absence of unnecessary details. It is optimal if the premises are located in a house with an adjacent free area, where it will be possible to place advertising or several types of goods (for example, wreaths) for greater visibility.

As for equipment, you will need to purchase a basic set: furniture, office equipment, as well as special equipment for the products presented (display cases, stands for coffins, hangers for funeral clothes, mounts for artificial flowers). On average, renting premises costs 50-80 thousand rubles per month in Moscow or 20-40 thousand rubles in the regions, and purchasing equipment will cost 250-400 thousand rubles, depending on whether it is new or used.

Personnel issue

An important stage in organizing work is hiring employees. You should choose people who do not experience fear or prejudice regarding what is associated with death and the dead, who are highly resistant to stress, sensitive and tactful. They will have to deal with grief-stricken relatives and friends. The reputation of the company largely depends on how employees can establish contact with clients.

It is advisable to organize the agency's work in two shifts, since its services may be required at any time, and to hire two salespeople and two secretaries. At first, it is better to take on the functions of an administrator and accountant; in the future, the latter responsibility can be outsourced.

To save money, it is better to hire a cleaner who will come twice a week. It is worth concluding contracts with hearse drivers, orchestra members and other specialized specialists as their services are needed, so as not to overpay for staff positions. Monthly payments to employees amount to 80-150 thousand rubles, depending on the region.

Advertising activity

To achieve success in such a business, as in any other, you need to pay attention to promoting the company and finding clients. You will have to spend from 30 to 100 thousand rubles on advertising in print and electronic form. It is advisable to combine several types of promotion so that the project begins to make a profit faster.

Another way to attract capital is to find a partner. Useful to read. Pros and cons of direct investment, finding a partner and the procedure for completing a transaction.

Ritual business is always relevant and profitable for their owners. The reason is simple - the number of people dying cannot be influenced in any way. All that remains is to watch how some come and others go. Or you don’t have to watch, helping grief-stricken relatives organize the farewell process.

Benefits of opening a funeral home

Compared to other types of business, a funeral home has the following advantages:

1. Stability. Deaths are recorded almost daily. Accordingly, new clients are constantly appearing.
2. Relatively low costs for starting a business. All that is needed is to find the necessary premises, personnel and transport.
3. Low costs for maintaining and developing business. The owner must pay salaries, utilities, rent and other expenses.
4. Undemanding advertising. Since organizing a funeral forces people to look for a specialized company on their own, it is not at all necessary to impose your services - you can subtly hint at help.

How to open a funeral home, prerequisites

In order to open this business, you must first find a suitable premises. Its volume must accommodate at least two departments - a work office and a showroom for selecting goods. From a geographical point of view, the ideal option is a room located in the central block.

As your business develops, you can invite a lawyer to work with you. The range of his tasks will include preparing all papers to resolve legal issues of relatives, as well as solving bureau issues. You can also engage in independent production of monuments, increasing the profitability of your business:

Calculation of approximate costs

Practice shows that the average statistical bureau spends up to 6 million rubles annually. The main costs are:

1. Rent of premises (from 25 rubles per month).
2. Purchase of equipment (up to 1 million rubles).
3. Purchase of computer equipment (up to 30 thousand rubles).
4. Website creation (30 rubles).
5. Advertising (RUB 72).
6. Payment of wages (from 3 to 4 million rubles, depending on the average salaries of city citizens).
7. Taxes (from 100 rubles per month).

At first, it is worth getting by with a small representative office that can satisfy the simplest needs of citizens. Its maintenance will cost approximately two and a half million rubles.

When implementing a business, it is necessary to pay attention to the income component. For example, if there are 50 orders per month with a minimum cost of 6 thousand rubles for each, a businessman will be able to receive 300 thousand rubles (3.6 million rubles per year), which is enough to meet the needs for loan payments, taxes and wages.

Where to start?

Initially, you need to register as an LLC. After registration, you must register with the tax service. If this step is completed, you can begin applying for a loan. To do this, you need to contact the bank and present a business plan for verification.

The client indicates the exact amount he expects to receive, as well as the period for providing credit funds. It is important to convince representatives of the banking institution that opening a new funeral home is beneficial for both parties - both the future owner and the financial institution.

After receiving loan money, you must first purchase or rent premises, and then prepare it for work. Complete the purchase of all the necessary equipment to carry out the work and the first shipment of goods. Only then find employees.

The standard list of funeral home employees, as a rule, includes an agent for communicating with people and accompanying funeral processions, a consultant for the sale of goods and an accountant.

If you plan to provide a wide range of services, you will additionally need the help of general workers, drivers, embalmers, makeup artists, and loaders. It wouldn’t hurt to have 1-2 employees who will constantly be on duty near the morgue and lure potential clients to your side.

How profitable can it be?

Having fulfilled all these requirements, you can start looking for clients. This requires a special marketing strategy. You can create it yourself, but this will not guarantee a positive result in the future.

To achieve this task, you need to use the support of professional advertising studios. They will independently develop all the necessary advertising, and will also ensure that it fully complies with the pre-set requirements.

In order to actively receive additional income, it is necessary from time to time to expand the list of services and increase the range of the company as a whole. One of the most profitable activities of funeral homes is the production of funeral accessories on the basis of their own enterprise.

It is necessary to first find specialists to work with wood and other materials, purchase equipment and allocate funds for employee salaries.

Profitability is achieved through potential customers who will not have to run around additionally in search of all the necessary goods, since you already have them in stock. As a rule, only those who have an existing business that has long been “in the black” decide to take such a step.

By complying with all the requirements outlined above, you can create a sustainable and efficient business that can constantly generate profits. The main thing is to constantly monitor its development and, as necessary, make appropriate adjustments. An interesting solution would be to open one, which does not require large investments if opened as a franchise.

Can a business be in demand?