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Will Wal-Mart Kill The Undertaking Business? A Marketing Lesson

by Martin Luxton
2 replies
Wal-Mart are going to start selling coffins.

BBC NEWS | Business | Wal-Mart starts selling coffins

Instead of the usual doom and gloom, Pat Lynch, of the National Funeral Home Directors Association had this to say:

Pat Lynch, of the National Funeral Home Directors Association, told AP news agency: "There's no question in my mind as a funeral director for nearly 40 years that the most critical element is the human contact."
So here's an interesting exercise for Warriors.

If you were marketing a Funeral Home facing competition from a local Wal-Mart what would you do and how would you position your client?

Martin
#business #kill #lesson #marketing #undertaking #walmart
  • Profile picture of the author Kevin Riley
    Originally Posted by Martin Luxton View Post

    Wal-Mart are going to start selling coffins.

    BBC NEWS | Business | Wal-Mart starts selling coffins

    Instead of the usual doom and gloom, Pat Lynch, of the National Funeral Home Directors Association had this to say:



    So here's an interesting exercise for Warriors.

    If you were marketing a Funeral Home facing competition from a local Wal-Mart what would you do and how would you position your client?

    Martin

    Easy. I'd be running an ad that features two scenarios. One, the caring funeral home manager consoling a grieving widow. The widow is seen as comforted and in loving hands in this scenario.

    In the second scenario, a bubble-gum popping teen in a Wal-Mart uniform (do they wear uniforms?) who nonchalantly greets the grieving widow. He answers her query about coffins by hitching his thumb over his shoulder and saying something like, "Over there, behind the leaf mulchers" to which the grieving widows starts wailing uncontrollably and has to be led out of the store by her son, who explains "That's how he died, you nincompoop!"
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    Kevin Riley, long-time Warrior living in Osaka, Japan

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