Mr. John Rodenburg: We are a family-owned business. We started in 1925 serving funeral homes. We made a niche for ourselves after World War II with the complications of the tax system - that's the bulk of our business. We have approximately 1,300 clients located in just about every state of the union. In addition to Springfield, Ill., we have a small office in Jacksonville, Fla., to serve the Southeast part of the country.
TWST: Would you paint a picture of the typical funeral home that works with you?
Mr. John Rodenburg: I would say the typical client does about 150 funerals a
year out of two locations; they fit the profile of a small business. Many of
them have retorts, which is the machinery that you use for cremation. A very
small percentage of our clients - probably 1% - own cemeteries. It's almost a
community service when our clients own cemeteries, and it's a totally different
business than funeral service. My opinion is that you should be in either the
funeral service or cemetery business, or at least have management that's attuned
to one side or the other.
Our funeral home clients are all family-owned, but that doesn't mean they are
all small. Our biggest client right now probably has about a dozen locations.
The corporate-owned funeral homes all have their own internal centralized
accounting that is typically done out of their home office.
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