Tag: Reshaping Sympathy

The series “Reshaping Sympathy” explores how the rituals around death and offering sympathy have changed during the COVID-19 pandemic. In this article, 1-800-Flowers.com Founder and Chairman Jim McCann reflects on sympathy trends that he expects will persist after the pandemic.

As an entrepreneur, I tend to think about the future. A lot. In recent conversations I had with funeral industry and mental health experts, we not only reflected on the struggles of the past year and the impact of COVID-19 but also discussed what we can expect going forward.

One common theme became clear through all my conversations: COVID-19 accelerated trends that were building before the pandemic.

For example, planning a funeral is no longer assumed to be an in-person event. People enjoy the convenience and flexibility of choosing whether to make arrangements online or at a funeral home, said Jamie Pierce, Chief Marketing Officer at Service Corporation International. The pandemic helped prove the point that everything from planning services to signing contracts can be done just as effectively online as in person.

Dr. Camelia Clarke, President of Paradise Memorial Funeral & Cremation Services in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, agreed. She told me that the industry has in the past year quickly learned to communicate with clients the way they want to be communicated with, be it via text, phone, Zoom or in person.

Another trend is that families are taking more time to plan, said Noha Waibsnaider, co-founder of GatheringUs, which conducts virtual memorial services. Pre-pandemic, clients typically requested a service within a week of reaching out. But now, most of her clients are taking three to four weeks to plan. The additional time to coordinate remembrances has allowed families to personalize moments, like having everyone bring ice cream if the person they are honoring loved ice cream or organizing a classic car salute for a loved one who adored old cars.

Even though in-person services have been making a comeback, Noha doesn’t expect them to be relegated to the history books as social-distancing restrictions ease. She says virtual events will become increasingly popular options – especially as families hold multiple events to remember their loved ones. Even before the pandemic, nontraditional activities like memorial lunches and other informal gatherings were gaining in popularity alongside traditional wakes and church or graveside services. Noha expects virtual events, particularly when held in conjunction with in-person events, to become a more popular option regardless of the type of memorial.

Outdoor memorial services are another trend that emerged pre-pandemic and accelerated over the past year, says Jamie of Service Corporation International. Certainly, geography and time of year are factors in the decision to hold a service outside. In 2020, these ceremonies grew in popularity for obvious reasons. Jamie expects their popularity to continue to grow even after pandemic restrictions ease.

As for funeral costs, Dr. Clarke of Paradise Memorial Funeral Homes predicts families will spend more overall in the coming years even though some costs will decline. As cremation rates continue to rise, for example, she expects families to spend less on traditional caskets and vaults. Families will instead look to spend more on cremation accessories such as personalized urns, technology services such as high-tech presentations, and catering with food and beverages.

With all of the change and disruption of 2020, Dr. Clarke has one final prediction: The funeral industry will see a wave of retirements of first- and second-generation funeral home owners. Consumers have embraced technology in ways they hadn’t ever previously this past year and have now come to expect a certain standard of technology across all aspects of their lives, including the funeral planning and event process. For some funeral home owners, the effort to upgrade their business to meet the new technology needs may be too much. Time will tell if this prediction holds true.

I think about the important work that the funeral directors have tirelessly carried out over the past year under astonishingly challenging circumstances to uphold the funeral ritual for families. While we look to the future, we must also look back to appreciate the journey. I thank all members of the funeral industry for their tireless efforts and perseverance and look forward to what the future will bring.

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The series “Reshaping Sympathy” explores how the rituals around death and offering sympathy have changed during the COVID-19 pandemic. In this article, 1-800-Flowers.com Founder and Chairman Jim McCann takes a look at how conversations about our mortality have changed.

Conversations about death were unavoidable for most of history. Relatively short lifespans meant people experienced the loss of a loved one or a friend at a much earlier age, and they had to confront it and talk about it. The rituals of death were woven into the tapestry of everyday life.

At some point in the last 70 years, however, we stopped talking about death. Advances in medicine meant that most people live into their 40s or 50s before experiencing a close personal loss. Modern life has sanitized the concept of death and dying as well as grief and expressing loss.

Alan Wolfelt, Ph.D., of the Center for Loss and Life Transition summed up the change: “Throughout human history, death was part of everyday life; now it’s seen as something that happens relatively uncommonly and also in the far, indefinite future. Until the current pandemic, a large majority of American’s had high levels of ‘assumed invulnerability’ surrounding death,” he says.

As David Kessler, a noted grief expert and founder of Grief.com, told me: “When I was a kid, when that hearse would go down the street, the man working on the electrical line would climb down and take his hat off and stand at attention. If we were mowing the lawn, we would turn the mower off and go to the street and stand there. We don’t know how to do that anymore.”

The impact of the pandemic

The pandemic that’s so far claimed more than a half-million lives has exposed our collective reluctance to talk about death. At the same time, it’s forced us to confront mortality in ways unseen in generations. We’re beginning to talk about death again and plan for it as well as learn new ways to mourn and express grief.

Dr. Camelia Clarke, the Paradise Memorial Funeral & Cremation Services owner in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, told me she’s witnessed the changing attitude first-hand. “People are acting much faster in the funeral pre-planning cycle than they historically have in my 25 years,” she says. “Normally, it was taking us three to four appointments with the family with getting them the information and (then they were) thinking about it. Now, I’ve seen that that’s reduced to half.”

Jamie Pierce, Chief Marketing Officer of Service Corporation International, has also seen a change in attitude toward death since the pandemic. “One thing positive that has come out is that people are talking about pre-planning probably more than they ever have,” she says. “Whether that’s getting their will together, or talking about their pre-arrangements, or what they want for their end of life service, we’ve seen a significant increase in people wanting to have that conversation.”

Helping difficult conversations

Are Americans finally ready to start talking about their own mortality? Though there are signs that the conversations are beginning to happen with increasing frequency, I believe we must do more to help people feel more comfortable talking about these difficult topics.

The internet is a good starting point. In fact, several organizations now assist people as they navigate conversations around the grieving process. I’ve had an opportunity to work directly with several, including:

• Connection Communities, a free online resource we developed at 1-800-Flowers.com to help people connect to others with similar life experiences, including coping with loss.
• The Floral Heart Project, which we co-created to provide beautiful, visual memorials across the country and to bring visibility to those suffering COVID-related losses.
• The End Well Project, which is focused on helping people connect, understand the rituals around loss, and better understand how to reach out to people in times of illness, loss, and grief. You can even join Dr. Shoshana Ungerleider, founder of End Well Project on Clubhouse to participate in conversations about grief and loss.

End Well is paying special attention to men, who seem to have trouble expressing their grief in times of loss, Shoshana told me in a recent conversation. She notes that men are less likely to engage with their families and friends to discuss difficult topics. “I know my father-in-law doesn’t know how to ask for help from his friends,” she says. “And he’s now reaching back out to them and feeling a little bit bad about how he wasn’t present for them (when their wives developed Alzheimer’s disease).”

I know it’s not just her father-in-law; it’s everyone. We can do better.

Families grieving the loss of a loved one from COVID-19 may also be experiencing a different kind of grief. “Many people grieving a COVID death are suffering from complicated grief,” Dr. Wolfelt says. “Their normal, necessary grief has often been made more complex by separation from the person who died as well as supportive friends and family. And if there was no funeral or satisfying ritual, they’re likely to feel even more adrift.

“These families need extra compassion and support, so I would encourage reaching out often — not just on the anniversary of the death but definitely including that day — and remembering that they may feel isolated and unsupported,” Dr. Wolfelt says. “If you can be a source of support in that vacuum, that is a wonderful gift indeed.”

Dr. Wolfelt believes the time has come for more conversations about our own mortality. “This new eclectic yet mutual understanding will help restore the importance of death rituals as well as everyday conversations about life, death, and grief,” he says.

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