Baby boomers are getting ‘hands on’ with their own ‘bespoke’ funerals

By Eustance Huang

Once an event that most would have left in the care of others, funerals are increasingly being planned ahead of time.

“It’s a transformational time for the funeral industry,” said Martin Earp, CEO of publicly traded funeral services company InvoCare .

Speaking with CNBC’s “The Rundown” on Wednesday, Earp said the company is seeing a shift in how people are approaching their own funeral, with demand mainly driven by baby boomers who have “completely different needs and wants” on how they would like to celebrate their departure.

While funeral services were traditionally “a little bit more of a standard offering,” he said, people are now looking for professionals to help them arrange and deliver on the event.

“Now, people are after a bespoke event,” Earp said, adding that “hands on” customers are now looking for something less formal than before — and they’re demonstrating a preference for “high quality AV solutions.”