CHANGES IN FUNERAL SERVICE

          At Everest of Thunder Bay, we pride ourselves on being both reactive to the needs and wishes of our changing community, and proactive in anticipating changes in our profession. Four generations of the Gardiner family have seen a great deal of evolution in the past 120+ years. We know and understand that change is an ongoing part of life and our future.

          When George Gardiner was building caskets and delivering them to family homes by horse and wagon, could he ever have imagined the funeral home concept which was pioneered by his son Bert, and is the norm today? Could he ever have conceived a motorized hearse, let alone its acceptance by the public?

          Could Bert, serving families in the traditional manner followed by burial, ever have imagined cremation as anything more than a passing fad? Urns, rental caskets, and basic cremation containers were unheard of, and therefore not even part of his business. However, we can assure you that if the need was present at the time, he would have been proactive in providing them.

          Ten years ago, very few people would have believed the popularity of the internet today, and we would never have conceived utilizing it to share our message or sell our products and services. Despite the open-mindedness and forward thinking of our predecessors and ourselves, it is often hard to envision the future. Thus, we must always be willing and able to adapt and change quickly. That is called evolution.

          The very evolution of funeral service, from cabinet makers to the modern funeral home, could not have happened without the willingness to change and the entrepreneurial spirit of the funeral service professionals of the past. They changed and evolved in direct response to the changing needs and wishes of the families they serve.

          Just like our previous generations, we have adapted quickly to meet the needs and demands of our client families. For years we have offered a large variety of contemporary cremation services and merchandise. These complement our more traditional offerings which many families still select. Our affiliation with "Simpler Times" is just one example of our commitment to change and evolution, and our willingness to meet the future of funeral service - whatever it might be.

          Ours is a "full-service funeral home". We are licensed by the Province of Ontario as a "Funeral Establishment", which means we can and do offer ALL services to the consumer, from the most basic to the most elaborate, and everything in-between.

          One of the difficulties in operating a "full service" funeral establishment today, is our need to "be everything to everyone". Despite the increase in cremation, and the changing needs of the consumer, we must also be able to properly serve the more traditional family. The contemporary family has much different requirements in funeral facilities, equipment, vehicles and merchandise, than the traditional burial family. This ultimately poses challenges for us, and increases our operating costs, but these are challenges that we have met and dealt with head-on. We have adapted our facilities to better serve our families; we have increased our contemporary and cremation services and merchandise; and we have made changes in our operations to better control our costs and ultimately our prices.

          At our Waverley Chapel, over the years we have made ongoing renovations and updates to make our facilities more handicap accessible and user friendly. Several years ago, we converted one of the large upstairs suites into a coffee / smoking / reception lounge. That same area now also houses our monument display area. The main floor of the building has received ongoing maintenance and redecorating, including additional lighting to greatly enhance the warmth of the traditional funeral home.

          Our Westfort Chapel was designed and built "from the ground up" as a fully accessible funeral home, with the ultimate in flexibility being our main goal. If you visit that location, we are sure that you will agree that we accomplished our goals.

           Outside of our buildings and staff, or vehicles are one of our largest operating costs. While a large fleet of vehicles is required to serve traditional families, they are not as important to the contemporary family. Therefore, while we continually maintain our fleet, we do not update and replace them as often as we did years ago. Likewise, our cars normally have very low mileage, so when we do replace them, instead of buying brand new cars, we typically look for "premium" used, lease returns. A low mileage, 3 year old vehicle in excellent condition, with some warranty remaining, can save us 50% on the cost of a new car. These practices, allow us to have the fleet we require for traditional services, while at the same time assist us in keeping our costs and prices affordable.

          Likewise, to increase our revenues from our limousines, we rent them to the general public, with a uniformed chauffeur, for weddings, birthdays, graduations, etc... These outside rentals are handled through our company, Golden Rule Limousine Service, which is a division of the funeral home. Rather than having the cars being dormant between funerals, the outside rentals help us to justify the ownership of the cars, and help keep our prices down.

          Staffing is another area where we have adapted to meet the changing needs of our profession. Funeral homes operate 7 days a week; are open up to 12 hours per day; with staff available 24 hours per day. Years ago we had a large group of full-time staff - both licensed funeral directors and support staff. Today we are fortunate to have a large number of good, reliable part-time people. These are individuals who have taken early retirement, but wish to still keep busy. Having these people available, as required, to do general maintenance, car-washing, evening reception, funeral assistance, etc... has been very helpful in our efforts to control costs and prices. We still have a core of full-time staff, but we utilize part-time people more than ever before, thus reducing our "fixed" staffing costs.

          As already mentioned, we have changed our services and merchandise to meet the needs of contemporary and cremation-minded families. For more than 2 decades, at Everest's we have offered a variety of "direct-disposition" services. As more families began selecting this type of service, we have offered more choices in options and packages for their consideration. At one time, we offered a choice of 4 urns, today we have a selection of over 25 urns! Years ago we assumed that cremation container meant plywood. Today we provide families with choices including cardboard, plywood, veneer, solid wood, and traditional caskets. For more than 10 years, at our firm we have offered rental caskets as an alternative to purchasing one. We have learned to not assume anything, but to provide full and complete options for every family, regardless of their choice of burial or cremation.

          Likewise, our affiliation with Simpler Times, will allow us, and the families we serve, even more options in services, merchandise and ideas, and we will continue to look forward to the future and address the needs and wishes of the community we serve.

        Thank you for visiting our web-site. We hope that you are finding it informative.

 - John-Bryan Gardiner, Vice-President, Managing Partner.