February 2017

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Page A6 FEBRUARY 2017 FUNERAL HOME & CEMETERY NEWS S ec t i on A
By Christopher Kuhnen
There’s More
To It...
Advance
Funeral
Planning
Where’s Your Next Sales
Prospect Coming From?
Christopher Kuhnen of Edgewood, Kentucky is a 29 year vet-
eran of funeral service. He is perhaps best known as an industry
go-getter and progressive leader. As an insider into excellence,
he is a trustworthy advisor to many funeral home and industry
professionals.
Kuhnen spent a good portion of his career working for a family
owned and operated funeral home and national pre-need sales
and marketing organization. He additionally was the architect and
founder of Funeral Profit Protectors, LLC. Currently he serves as
Vice President of Pre-Need Marketing for the Unity Financial Life
Insurance Company, Cincinnati, Ohio.
Chris is a Kentucky Licensed Funeral Director, Life Insurance
Agent, Certified Pre-Planning Consultant (CPC), Insight Institute
Certified Funeral Celebrant and Certified Marketing Specialist, as
bestowed by the former American Marketing Academy.
Chris can be reached at (859) 307-7223 or
There’s one constant in pre-need sales: Once you make a
sale, you need to have another sales prospect to move onto,
or your sales career is dead. Without workable prospects,
you have no way to make sales. Therefore, when, where,
and how you obtain your prospects is vitally important.
There are many ways to obtain quality sales lead pros-
pects. Some easier and faster than others. If you wish to
take better control of your pre-need program in 2017, then
start today by cultivating your sales lead prospect pipeline.
The first thing to fully understand and internalize about
prospects is that they are everywhere and plentiful. There
are numerous prospects you come across on any given day.
You just aren’t cognizant of it. Anyone and everyone who
hasn’t prearranged and pre-funded their final wishes is a
viable prospect. The only human beings that don’t make
good sales prospects are those who will truly never die. If
you will never die (or honestly believe you never will) then
you have no want, need or desire to learn about planning
ahead. It’s a waste of your time.
However, if you are like any normal human being, you
know full good and well you will die one day, and nobody
really knows when that day will arrive. Therefore learning
someone you know, please feel free to give me a call and
let’s talk about it. I’d appreciate it. Thank you!” A few
simple words are all it takes to get your card into their
hand. Let nature take its course from there. Again, you
will be pleasantly surprised at the number of people who
will engage with you when you take this easy and relaxed
approach with them. It’s all designed to start a conversa-
tion. Once the conversation gets started, follow their lead
and see where things end up.
Make 2017 the year that you act boldly, confidently,
and decisively about your career as a professional Funeral
Pre-Need Representative. What you do for a living mat-
ters greatly! You help people plan for what will possibly
be the very worst day of their lives. You help make things
a little easier for them and their families when that day
arrives. No amount of money can begin to adequately
buy the gift you freely offer families: the gift of knowl-
edge, understanding, compassion, dignity, and help to
make anyone’s final remembrance on this Earth the best
and most memorable it can be.
all your choices and options, in regards to your final disposi-
tion options, makes just as much good sense today as it does
any other day of your life. People put it off because nobody
has directly approached and offered them the opportunity to
openly talk about it. People don’t want to be sold or feel like
they are “being sold” something. They just want to be able to
relax, talk, and learn in a casual, no-high pressure, no sales-
hype atmosphere. If you create and afford them this type of
an environment, they will engage. Try this and I believe you
will quickly see that you will speak with more people than
you can possibly imagine. People love to buy – they just hate
to be “sold”. Don’t sell! Create an environment where they
can buy in comfort and confidence.
How do you spread the word around that you are ready,
willing and able to speak with anyone, anytime, anywhere
about final remembrance services, choices and options? Pro-
actively market yourself and your availability.
Here is a short list of ways you can accomplish that: social
media, blog and funeral home website platforms, newspaper
press releases, newspaper display ads or flyer inserts, commu-
nity door-to-door direct mail campaigns, radio or cable tele-
vision advertising, networking events, community speaking
engagements, attendance at sponsored community events
such as senior health fairs, church socials, community gath-
erings, veterans programs. What about door to door canvass-
ing? Aftercare programs? Media interviews or published arti-
cles about planning ahead? Lunch and Learn programs? The
list of ways to reach people to talk with is only limited by your
imagination.
People are circulating every day in and out and through
your community. Get out there and circulate with them.
Pass out your business cards to everyone you come across at
Chamber of Commerce or church gatherings, community or
civic group gatherings, family gatherings, concerts, sporting
events, music events, social events, at the supermarket buying
groceries, at the gas station pumping gas, at all the fast food
restaurants you visit weekly, etc. Everywhere you go, you see
people. When you approach them, hand them your business
card and simply say, “Hi, My name is Chris Kuhnen and this
is what I do for a living. If I can ever be of service to you or
“Business is down
and
I don’t knowwhy?”
For answers to questions like this, ask about Market Research from MKJ Marketing.
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IN THE DEATH CARE INDUSTRY
Dedicated and focused, Bill’s knowledge and experience of the
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compliance audits, multi-state taxation and much more.
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Partner
The Family Funeral Home Celebrates 10 Years
Family Funeral Home Staff. (L to R) Front: Kenneth W. Cattenhead
and Kenita Atwater-Cosme. Back: Terrence Bell and Bernard Taylor.
NEWARK,NJ— December 7, 2016 marked the 10th
anniversary of a dream for Kenneth W. Cattenhead.
In his early years in the industry Kenny thought he
would move from New Jersey to Ashtabula, OH to be
near family and open a firm in an area that had few
African American mortuaries.
Kenny’s boss and adoptive father Herbert A. Jack-
son convinced him to stay in New Jersey. Three years
after his passing, Kenny had a calling and showed his
vision of a facility about 30 minutes away to Mrs. Au-
drey E. Jackson. With
her blessings The Family
Funeral Home soon be-
came a reality.
“Through the years I’ve
accomplished quite a bit.
My late boss always taught me to take care
of the people. I know I made the right
choices when every now and then, a grate-
ful bereaved family member will tell me,
you did a wonderful job, you took care of
us just like Herby,” reflected Kenny.
Allegheny Cemetery hosts Stephen C.
Foster Memorial Concert
PITTSBURGH,PA— Allegheny Cemetery
celebrated the life and works of Stephen C.
Foster on January 13, 2017, in the Temple
of Memories at the cemetery.
The prolific composer, known world-wide
as “The Father of American Music,” was re-
membered with a musical tribute on the
153rd anniversary of his death. Though his
subject matter often recalls life in the ante-
bellum South, America’s first composer was
actually a Pittsburgh native born and raised
in Lawrenceville, only a few blocks from
Allegheny Cemetery, where he now rests.
Foster captured the lives of working peo-
ple in their own voices, tones and dialects,
with melodies and rhythms that the aver-
age American could identify with and easily
recall. His songs have been covered and re-
recorded by contemporary artists like Bob
Dylan, Johnny Cash, James Taylor, Mary J.
Blige, Bruce Springsteen and more.
The free event was co-sponsored by the
Allegheny Cemetery Historical Associa-
tion and the University of Pittsburgh’s
Center for American Music and included
words and performance accompaniments
by Dr. Deane Root. Students from St. Ra-
phael School in Morningside performed
Foster favorites studied in the classroom.
Local musicians Lisa Bleil and Scott An-
derson gave a live performance of Foster
covers. Noted local Historian, James Wu-
darczyk , from the Lawrenceville Histori-
cal Society, spoke on Foster’s life and leg-
acy. Cemetery General Manager, Thomas
J. Staresinic hosted the educational ser-
vice that is the longest running event of its
kind in the nation.
Allegheny Cemetery was founded in 1844
as a non-denominational, non-profit burial
ground meant to preserve the legacy of Pitts-
burgh’s departed citizens and serve the living
as a botanical garden park. It is open for visi-
tation daily and hosts several free commu-
nity cultural events each year, including the
Stephen Foster Music and Heritage Festival
(“Doo Dah Days”) each July in partnership
with the Lawrenceville Historical Society.
Stephen Foster is interred Allegheny Cem-
etery’s Section 2I, Lot 30/31.
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