Funeral Consumers Alliance

An Invitation to Funeral Pricing Abuse

If we were to die Monday through Friday — with one funeral a day — and two weeks off for the mortician's vacation, the following chart shows the number of funeral homes that would be needed in each state, compared to the actual number. There are undoubtedly some funeral homes that can handle more than one funeral a day, which reduces the "needed" number accordingly and probably explains the figures for California, Hawaii, and Nevada.

Certainly in rural areas with sparse population, a funeral home does not expect the dying business to be a full-time one, and more establishments will be needed to cover the geographic area than the number generated by a simple death-rate formula. In most other states, however, the number of funeral homes far exceeds that which can be reasonably supported by the death-rate. (In Kansas, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, and Vermont, there are almost four times the needed mortuaries; in Iowa there are five times too many!)

Why are so many funeral homes still in business? Because of high mark-ups that consumers pay — either willingly or because they just don't know what their other options are. It's a situation that invites pricing abuse!

State	Needed	Existing
Alabama	186	404
Alaska	13	19
Arizona	173	146
Arkansas	112	287
California	878	771
Colorado	118	170
Connecticut	117	297
Delaware	28	66
DC	22	30
Florida	674	755
Georgia	266	651
Hawaii	36	21
Idaho	42	73
Illinois	422	1,213
Indiana	224	649
Iowa	113	476
Kansas	99	326
Kentucky	160	494
Louisiana	171	299
Maine	50	125
Maryland	179	245
Massachusetts	223	628
Michigan	347	731
Minnesota	150	430
Mississippi	116	293
Missouri	221	595
Montana	33	77
Nebraska	62	232
Nevada	71	43
New Hampshire	39	91
New Jersey	294	729
New Mexico	59	75
New York	629	1,850
North Carolina	294	720
North Dakota	24	100
Ohio	439	1,132
Oklahoma	141	379
Oregon	124	171
Pennsylvania	506	1,801
Rhode Island	40	102
South Carolina	152	405
South Dakota	29	107
Tennessee	228	456
Texas	616	1,201
Utah	54	85
Vermont	20	59
Virginia	233	465
Washington	179	199
West Virginia	84	279
Wisconsin	185	544
Wyoming	17	32

Source: National Vital Statistics Report, Vol. 52, No. 22, June 10, 2004 - National Center for Health statistics, and a report of established funeral homes taken from 2003 figures quoted in "Funeral Service Insider," a trade publication. FSI cites the 2003 "Red Book," a national directory of morticians, as its source for the number of funeral homes by state.It is likely that the figures for the number of existing funeral homes are approximate only. When quoting from this chart, please credit FCA. Copyright ©