Breaking Barriers: Why the Professional Women's Conference Always Keeps Progressing

Precoa Regional Vice President Kelly Kohut and @need Creative Director Jenny McClanahan recently participated in the National Funeral Directors Association Professional Women's Conference, one of the premier events for women and non-binary leaders to come together and share ideas that are propelling the profession forward. Jenny and Kelly presented "Your Move: A workshop about consumer change and how it will transform funeral planning and purchasing." It was an eye-opening experience and led to a number of great discussions about how to engage families and build the value of funeral service now and into the future.

Together, Jenny and Kelly share how meaningful their experience at the conference was and why they continue to look forward to attending year after year.

Can you share what your experience was like at the conference this year?

Kelly Kohut: We're always excited in the weeks and days leading up to the Professional Women's Conference. There are so many people we look forward to seeing and it's such a thrill to connect with other women in the funeral profession.

It's such an authentic and genuine group, and they're lovely to be around. It was striking this year to see so many women in senior leadership from across the industry. It was so great to get everyone in a room together.

Jenny McClanahan: I loved seeing the diversity of seniority this year. When you see leaders like Lisa Baue sitting next to people who are completely fresh to the profession, it really made clear that this event is not about titles. It's about caring about funeral service.

KK: And we loved having Ellen Wynn McBrayer, a Precoa partner who is president and CFO of Jones-Wynn Funeral Homes & Crematory, as the emcee of the event! We were thrilled when she won the NFDA Inspiration Award last year, and she was such a great host for the entire conference.

JM: There's something to be said about having such an experienced funeral director being the host. Our organizations are here to support funeral directors, and we know how dedicated they are to serving families and helping them move through a loss. So for the conference to be guided by a successful funeral director really set the tone for an incredible weekend.

How was it different from years past?

KK: The conference is built around breaking down barriers and giving the profession's current and future leaders a space where they can share, learn, and grow. So it was great to see a lot of opportunities to honor and celebrate the people who came on scholarships. It was exciting seeing how the gratitude flowed, from the scholarship winners to the leaders in our profession and everyone involved.

JM: The scholarship winners were truly from all over this year. The gratitude they all have to be among some incredible women in our profession is really wonderful to witness. They don't take it lightly.

KK: It was also great to see Leili McMurrough win the Inspiration Award this year. Seeing someone who is not only the president and program director for Worsham College of Mortuary Science and Chair of the Committee on Accreditation for the American Board of Funeral Service Education but also a mom was outstanding, and very relatable.

JM: Maybe it's because it was my second time presenting to this group, but I felt like I was more relaxed this year. When you're talking to funeral directors about the funeral profession, you want to make sure you're talking from your expertise. I'm a marketer, so I'm not there to tell anyone how to be a funeral director – my experience has more to do with engaging the community and helping more people build relationships with their local funeral homes. But everyone was so welcoming and excited to be there. It felt great!

The title of your talk was "Your Move: A workshop about consumer change and how it will transform funeral planning and purchasing." How are you seeing consumer behavior change in the funeral space?

KK: More and more, we're seeing families shop around for funeral homes. Nearly 60 percent of people who have experienced a loss will compare prices between funeral homes. The meaning of ceremony, ritual, and gathering is still important to people, but they don't know where to go to understand their options, largely because there are fewer community and institutional ties.

JM: We talked in our presentation about the continued rise of "religious nones," the nearly 30 percent of Americans who no longer attend church. Now they might still value spirituality, and often do. But when it comes to funeral celebrations, the amount of people who have their services at their home church or with specific religious practices has decreased, leading more people to either DIY their funeral or go with the least expensive option.

KK: In addition to religious changes, the rate of divorce for people over 50 has more than doubled in the last 35 years, and for adults over 65 it has tripled. The rise of "gray divorce" and the fact that 60 percent of Americans have moved away from their hometowns has made it more difficult for funeral homes to build brand equity and loyalty within their community.

How do you anticipate this continuing to change?

KK: The makeup of communities will certainly continue to change. Moving service northAmerican estimates more than 30 million U.S. residents will move at least once in the next 6 months. And more than 3 million of those people are older than 65 years old, often the target demographic for funeral homes.

If you're not being proactive when it comes to your marketing, it will be harder and harder to count on loyalty and legacy business from the families in your community.

More importantly, what can funeral homes do in response to these changes?

JM: People don't know what they don't know. And it's up to the funeral home or their marketing partners to get the word out on what they can offer.

When my mom passed, I was sure a funeral home was only going to give me a "traditional" service. So I took so much on myself to build the service we wanted. And I didn't need to do that. If I better understood at the time that most funeral homes could have provided everything I needed – and more – I could have left a lot of it up to their expertise.

Your session included breakout sessions where attendees were encouraged to be creative and share how to better attract families to their local funeral homes. Can you share what that experience was like? What were some of the takeaways?

JM: We have learned through research and experience that one of the most important questions for funeral homes to ask themselves is "How do you get people to know your business before they need you?"

People are understanding it more because cool services are happening that are not traditional or direct cremation. And it became clear through these breakout sessions that funeral homes today are up for that conversation more than ever.

Would you want to go to this conference again?

JM: Without a doubt! I'll be there every year I'm able to attend!

KK: Year after year, this conference is great. Even though it continues to grow, it still feels intimate. It's been great that women still have access to an event in this profession that speaks to us and brings us together.