Every figure on this page survived adversarial verification against its cited source. This is the data your next five years of decisions rest on — case mix, case volume, disposition law, and what non-compliance actually costs.
Every point of cremation share moves revenue mix away from full-service burial — model your case mix against the curve, not last year.
Case volume is normalizing post-pandemic — 2024 fell ~0.6% and the age-adjusted rate is the lowest since 2020. Plan for flat-to-down volume before the boomer wave.
Legalization is compounding — and Maryland showed an ~18-month lag from legal to operational rules. Michigan has no bill yet; Ohio introduced one in Nov 2025.
Source: Recompose / Earth Funeral legislative trackers, verified per state (WA 2019 → NJ #14, Sept 2025)
Why members see this first
Trade press reports what happened. The Pulse tells you what it costs — and what to do before the deadline.
Weekly digest, bill-by-bill tracking, CE compliance, and this ledger — curated by humans, verified against primary sources.
What regulators and prosecutors actually did — and what it cost the operators involved. Every entry links to the primary document.
Michigan · Huron County
Kaufman & Co. Funeral Home — preneed funds never escrowed for a decade
85–240 months · 39 felonies incl. Conducting a Criminal Enterprise
primary source$1.11M
restitution to 204 victims
Colorado · federal
Return to Nature Funeral Home — 190 bodies never cremated or buried
240 months federal prison (co-owner: 18 years, March 2026)
primary source$1.07M
restitution
Texas · state board
Texas Funeral Service Commission enforcement docket — investigations, C&Ds, closure
Golden Gate FH investigation · Nassiri body-broker C&D · Richardson Mortuary closure
primary sourceIllinois · legislature
Illinois HB 4695 (pending) — crematory accountability after Chicago Heights
30-day notice trigger · 60-day cremation deadline · mandatory SOPs
primary source$10,000
max fine per violation (proposed)
The consolidation wave, deal by deal. Nearly half of owners plan to retire by 2028 — whoever is buying your market is worth knowing before they call.
Michigan
O’Brien-Sullivan Funeral Home, Novi — sold after 128 years of family ownership
John P. O’Brien → Rollings Funeral Service (GA)
Founded 1898; name retained under the new owner. Valuation undisclosed.
sourcePark Lawn Corp. taken private
Homesteaders Life / Birch Hill (via Viridian)
≈C$1.2B for ~170 locations — after divesting 72 cemeteries and 11 funeral homes to Everstory Partners (~$70M, late 2023).
source~$871M
deal value
SCI keeps buying
Service Corporation International
26 funeral properties + 6 cemeteries acquired in 2024; $71M more in real estate through Q3 2025.
source$181M
deal value
The new roll-ups arrive
Milestone Funeral Partners · Big Sky Capital Partners
Milestone: 0 → 90 firms since 2021 (36 of 39 shareholders are licensed directors). Big Sky: 10+ properties, 10 in talks. Engine: nearly half of owners plan to retire by 2028 (NFDA 2023 survey).
sourceSource: BLS OEWS May 2025 (SOC 39-4031) · BLS OOH · MN House testimony
+$100 on a median casket
Steel tariffs rose 25% → 50% in 2025 and an April 2026 decree added a 25% coffin-specific tariff — U.S. casket prices are up ~4.5% in 15 months (Fed/FRED price data).
Progressive Policy Institute analysis of FRED dataMethodology: figures verified via multi-source adversarial review (see docs/research in the project archive) · projections attributed to their estimator and rendered dashed · updated 2026-07-06.