Death care industry in the United States

The death care industry in the United States includes companies and organizations that provide services related to death: funerals, cremation or burial, and memorials. This includes for example funeral homes, coffins, crematoria, cemeteries, and headstones. The death care industry within the U.S. consists mainly of small businesses, although there has been considerable consolidation over time.

The death care industry in the United States is controversial due to the exorbitant costs of services, as well as the adverse impact of common U.S. funeral practices. The practices of death care companies are frequently supported by onerous state regulations that hike up prices and worsen environmental effects.

The advent of embalming in the normal course of preparation of corpses for burial led directly to the transition of death care from a job predominately performed by women at home to an industry. During the Civil War, hundreds of soldiers died away from home and the process of embalming aided in preserving the bodies until they could be transported for burial. The process gained popularity after the funeral procession of Abraham Lincoln's embalmed corpse. Early techniques in embalming were primitive: an article in 1898, written in the Journal of Medicine and Science criticized and brought to attention the manner in which the arsenic used to preserve corpses had leached into the soil and the groundwater near cemeteries. The first embalming school, Cincinnati School of Embalming, was created in 1882. As a means of monitoring and establishing the protocol for handling corpses, the first mortuary schools were established in 1898, along with the National Funeral Directors Association, which is still the leading industry association today.

Prior to the mid-19th century, the dead were prepared, dressed, and displayed by their own family. The body was displayed in a homemade or purchased casket in the family's home. Wealthier families had "proper" rooms that held their finest possessions during viewings, and some family homes had a separate door known as a "coffin door" or "death door" to remove the body as it was custom for the body not to cross a doorway where the living crossed.

Embalming emerged during the Civil War since many soldiers were dying on the battlefield and their families wanted their bodies sent back home for burial. Dr. Auguste Renouard, a pioneer in the field of embalming, published The Undertakers' Manual in 1878. The first embalming school, the Cincinnati School of Embalming, was founded in 1882 by Joseph Henry Clarke, and in 1883, Dr. Renouard opened the Rochester School of Embalming. The push for embalming occurred simultaneously with the move away from families caring for the dead and for undertakers to organize themselves as "professionals". The first professional trade association was established in Philadelphia in 1964.

The first national convention for funeral directors was held in Rochester, New York in 1882 after Alan Durfee, a Michigan funeral director planned a successful statewide convention. The first constitution of the National Funeral Directors Association was drafted in 1882.

The industry underwent changes as the public responded to Jessica Mitford's The American Way of Death in 1963. The book was released at a time when consumer consciousness and empowerment altered Americans' buying and spending habits. Due to the response to Mitford's book, the Federal Trade Commission began its own investigation of the death care industry in the 1970s. By 1984, the FTC issued the Federal Trade Rule which included regulations such as requiring funeral directors to provide detailed, itemized price lists to all clients, informing clients that embalming is not required by law, and allowing clients to choose non-traditional alternatives.

Millennials have been raised in and grown up in a time of extreme technology growth. As such, the marketing strategies required to reach them will need to change. Several moves the industry may take include the use of technology, using social media, and offering non-traditional services or venues. "Millennials don't want to die any more than any other generation. They are just embracing the need to discuss tough subjects, like death." The topic of death and the career paths dealing with the dying process are becoming less taboo in the media, and with social media influencers, younger generations are learning more about death positivity. Additionally, this generation is not only expected to impact the industry based on their spending but also through their labor. By 2030, millennials will constitute 75% of the workforce for the death care industry.