Typically someone in the family becomes the decision maker in regard to the whole funeral service. They decide what funeral home and where they will buy the casket. Unfortunately what is the most common practice is to go to the closest funeral home while the tears are still fresh and buy everything without regard to price. Every funeral home loves this. This is what we suggest that you do below: Step 1: Read all of the notes on these pages in regard to strategies to save money. Step 2: Call us to get the final price on the casket, the time when you will receive it and also ask any other additional questions that you may have. Step 3: Talk to the decision maker in your family about our web site and have them read these pages of suggestions. The negotiating tactics will still save you thousands even if you do not decide to buy from us. This decision maker has already stepped forward to assume responsibility for handling this and they typically take the easiest and most expensive way by going to the nearest funeral home. This is a financial disaster. It is equivalent to going to buy a car from your local car dealer and telling him that you are definitely going to buy a car from him and then asking him for a price on a car. Funeral homes have often told us the name of the game is to get the body and then figure out what is the most the family can afford to pay and then you simply bring out a “package deal” which includes their casket. That package deal could be $4000, $10,000 or $20,000. Their choice based on what they think you will pay. Don’t want to leave any money on the table as they say. Step 4: Have the decision maker call us to ask additional questions. Help them to think that this is their decision to buy online. Some decision makers will not do anything suggested by someone else purely because it is not their idea. The idea here is to spend $8,000 on the funeral and not $15,000. Step 5: Shop around as stated below with different funeral homes starting with the furthest away. Get itemized lists from each one called a “General Price List” which they are required by law to give you before they give you their package prices. Notice how one charges $500 for embalming and the next $1000. Typical funeral services are $4500 to $5000 in rural areas. In the metropolitan areas those servicing African American funeral homes can be $2000 to $5000. Funeral homes serving mixed races charge typically $5000 to $10,000. For major metropolitan areas, often we can make suggestions.
Reduced to most practical terms, a casket is simply a container designed to hold the remains of the deceased. Caskets protect the dignity of the deceased and provide a beautiful way to have your loved one’s remains on display during a funeral or memorial services. In early days, the casket (or coffin) was primarily functional. Over time, the tradition of purchasing a casket based on design has grown as a way to honor the person who will be protected by the casket.
Casket costs vary widely. A simple casket may be as low as a $1,000. Fully customized high-end models can go as high as tens of thousands of dollars. Fortunately, there is a wide range of options in all price ranges. This means you can easily find a beautiful casket to suit any taste and budget.
The cost of a casket is determined primarily by what it is made of. Pricing is not unlike that of fine furniture. For example, caskets made of rare hardwoods such a mahogany will be more expensive that those made of common, readily available woods such as pine. High-end bronze models will be more expensive than those of stainless steel. The amount and type of ornamentation will also be a factor in the price. Customization and personalization can also add to the cost of the casket. The mark-up for caskets varies as widely as the prices. While it may be difficult to shop around, it is possible to save money by comparing prices. Funeral homes tend to have the highest mark-ups followed by retail showrooms. Online providers normally have the lowest pricing.
No. You do not have to purchase your casket from the funeral home. The Funeral Rule, a law designed to protect consumers, specifies that your funeral home is required to accept a casket from a third party seller. You can also buy your headstone from a monument dealer. Casket Emporium only sells caskets, we don’t sell monuments or headstones.
We get our inventory from an independent manufacturer. We also do not have the high overhead of a funeral home, therefore we are able to offer the lowest pricing on almost any casket your local funeral home sells, shipped straight to the funeral home within a day.
Yes, we at Casket Emporium go through an extensive quality control process at the factory to ensure our caskets are of the highest quality. Please refer to our return policy.
Quite frankly, the funeral homes do not want you to purchase anything related to a funeral elsewhere because it takes business away from them. However, with the growing number of customers exploring the option of online casket purchasing, the “steering” of a customer to funeral home provided funeral necessities has reduced over the past couple years.
Normally the viewing at the very earliest is 2 days after someone passes. We can usually get a casket to you within 1-2 days from anywhere in the country. We use all major airports to deliver the casket directly to the funeral home door, or your personal residence. If you’re located near one of my major warehouses, we can personally deliver the same day or next day.
There are 200 suppliers of caskets in the USA. All are made the same way. The only quality difference between them is our most popular casket which is our 18gauge steel and all wood caskets have the thicker more expensive velvet lining. We also finish out the caskets on the foot end with velvet and if you open the foot end of a funeral home casket you will see bare cardboard. They don’t even bother to finish them out. Why not buy from the wholesale distributor, us, and cut out the funeral home. Again, we show you 650 models and the funeral home shows you 7 or 8. We always have every model that they have, so it comes down to paying us $1095 and get it next day or buy from the pictures at the funeral home for $5000 and get it next day.
Order online or call us to order over the phone and we will ship the casket out today to the funeral home of your choice. We will need to know the zip code of the funeral home so that we can calculate the extra cost of our expedited shipping if it is necessary. Once you know what casket you want, the order process only takes about 5 minutes.
We accept all major credit or cebit cards including Master Card, Visa, Discover and American Express. We also accept Paypal & Cash App. If you’d prefer to do a wire transfer from your bank, that can be accomodated as well – please contact us. For those wanting to pay cash, please contact us for more details. You can also send us cashier checks by mail or express overnight. Call us for more information on how to send money by Western Union or our bank wire information.
The casket is shipped in one of two special cargo compartments under the commercial passenger airplanes (typically American, Delta or United) apart from the other luggage. There is a thin layer of Styrofoam, followed by a layer of bubble wrap. Over that are placed large blocks of hard Styrofoam which provide most of the support as well as 5″ thick styrofoam caps over both ends. Over that is a double-walled cardboard box and then another double-walled box over that.There is roughly 3-5 inches between the outer box and the inner casket so if the box is ruffled on the outside, the casket will not be scratched or dented 3-5 inches below the box surface. After it gets to the airport the courier typically picks up your casket and delivers it directly to the funeral home in a van. We will email you or text you to notify you that the casket has been delivered.
It is best to get the pricing before your loved one passes. If that is not possible, then it is best to send someone in they do not recognize to get the pricing. Basically you approach them saying 1) You do not have much money, no insurance, you are the only one paying and you don’t have any choice but to choose a funeral home that gives you the best pricing. 2) You do not live that close (3-4 miles away if lots of funeral homes around and 10-15 miles away if there are only 1 or 2 funeral homes around. So in summary, I am shopping, shopping, shopping, I don’t live close and this is all out of pocket and I am the only one paying. I am getting some help because my aunt has already purchased a casket so I am only shopping for the funeral and burial services. You will want to buy the casket from us because we have 650 models to choose from with an average price of $850 to $1,095. The funeral home is $2,000 to $5,000 for similar caskets and they will only show you 7-8 to pick from.
We sell directly to funeral homes that want better pricing than what’s typically offered to them. We charge the funeral homes the same price that we charge you.
Unfortunately, we cannot.
Yes we do. We make our own head panels, customized to family choice. What is the cost? They start at $125.00 and go up in price the more details there have. Funeral homes charge $400 to $500 extra or any many times can’t get them at all. We can also get you custom embroidered panels with names or anything else you want on it; please contact us for more info.
The caskets come with a 5-inch Allen wrench with a handle on it. You must unscrew a bolt that is in the right end of the casket, insert the Allen wrench in the hole and turn it counter-clockwise 15 turns to open. All funeral homes will have these Allen wrenches on site and it fits everyone’s caskets.
We sell 93% half couch caskets and 7% full couch caskets. With half couch caskets, both halves independently open up but during viewing or visitation, only the left half is opened up to display the upper part of your loved one. With full couch caskets, the top is just one piece and the full length of your loved one is viewed during visitation. With the full couch casket, often they come with a foot panel that is removable and covers the lower part of your loved one. Sometimes a blanket is used to cover part of your loved one. The funeral homes usually do not have any and often have to buy from us.
Many funeral homes have refrigeration to help preserve the body past 30 days if necessary. Most people have visitation 3 to 10 days after the actual death.
We do ship to Hawaii,only Honolulu. We do ship to Alaska and have our own associate in Alaska to help. Shipping will cost more; the procedure is the same.
Caskets come in different widths. If a man is less than 240 pounds or a woman is less than 200 pounds they will usually fit in a standard 24″ or 23.5″ inside width. We have other caskets that are 25.5″, 26″, 27.5″ and 28″ wide inside which also fit in a standard vault. We have larger inside widths of 29.5″, 31.5″, 33.5″, 35.5″, 38.5″ and 42.5″ that require oversize vaults. If you get the 31.5 or larger often you have to get oversized plots or use two plots. Funeral homes don’t have have access to many oversized caskets and quite often buy from us.
Yes, we have 160 models of solid wood and wood veneer caskets. Is solid wood better than the wood veneer? Yes, Veneer is thin and solid wood is thicker. If we charge $1395 for a solid poplar casket, the funeral home is usually $5000 to $6000. On solid mahogany, we are $2995 and the funeral home is usually around $8000 to 12,000.
All metal caskets that are 24″ to 28″ wide inside will fit in a standard vault. All wood caskets that are 23.5″ inside will fit in a standard vault. Larger caskets need an oversized vault. We have the largest selection of oversized caskets in the world with over 150 models. To see them, go to the oversize caskets tab on the top left side of the web site. Funeral homes hate it when they have to buy from us because we are the only one that has that particular size and color. 80% of all the caskets we sell are sold directly to the funeral homes.
Everything you see in the picture comes with the casket including the lining, pillow, throw (material laying on right half of the casket), and overlay (material hanging down in front), Allen wrench for unlocking it, lining, and memory tube if applicable. The Allen wrench used to unlock our caskets is the same allen wrench used to unlock all the funeral home caskets.
18 Gauge is about 30% thicker metal than the 20 gauge caskets. Obviously the thicker caskets cost more. Your car is around 18-gauge metal. 20-gauge is about the thickness of your license plate. Our 18-gauge caskets weigh 210 pounds and our 20-gauge caskets weigh 170 pounds. We sell mostly the thicker 18-gauge. We are about $995-$1095 on 18ga and the funeral home is $3000 to $6000. Same caskets except ours have the nicer velvet lining that theirs do not have. When you lift up the right hand side of a funeral home casket, often it will not even be lined but rather have bare cardboard. This is one way to tell if a funeral home is buying the cheapest quality of casket they can buy which is often the case. Check for the lining material on the 18gauge steel caskets and check to see if they are finished out on the foot end or do they have bare cardboard. If the funeral home is going to cut corners on things you can easily see, can you imagine the corners they cut on things you can’t see on the casket.
The law says they have to accept the casket if they have your loved one. It is rare that they will store the casket, before they have your loved one because they don’t want to help you in buying a casket elsewhere.
We are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week including Holidays. Were available at 800 618 4642. Email Info@casketemporium.com
Please call to inquire. Charges are based on location.
Yes, you can pick up the casket with a suburban, cargo van or pickup truck (if using a pickup truck, make sure you have a way of strapping the box in. It is 7’2″ long and 30″ wide and 25″ tall. If you pick it up from the airport, then you only have to pay the flight cost. The funeral home could easily pick it up, but they won’t because they are not making any money on the casket and they do not want to make it too easy for you.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) wanted to give consumers a choice on where to buy their casket realizing that the funeral homes add thousands to the prices. The Funeral Rule 1984 is a federal law that the funeral home is required to accept outside caskets and vaults and they have to give you an itemized list (General Price List) of all of their services over the phone or in person on printed pages. The funeral home prefers to offer Package pricing which includes their overpriced caskets. It is illegal for them to only offer package pricing or to not accept a casket from another supplier. Often the funeral home illegally will require you to be present when it arrives. They do this to inconvenience the family and to build doubt that you need to be there to see it when it comes.
All of our 18ga metal caskets and half of our thinner metal 20ga are sealers and have locks.
No, typically the insurance company pays the funeral home only.
We offer financing through Affirm. The link is attached to each casket. The payment options through Affirm are subject to an eligibility check and are provided by these lending partners : affirm.com/lenders.
The statistics say that the average funeral home in the USA does 50-100 funerals per year or approximately 1-2 per week. That one sale per week has to pay all the overhead and bills plus make a profit, so yes they are outrageous. Rural ones are $4500-$5000 and city or suburban ones are typically $6000 to $9,000 just for the funeral services plus the casket. The nicer funeral homes and especially the ones with attached cemeteries are usually $2000 to $3000 more than the small independent funeral homes. You can transfer from one funeral home to another and only pay a $495 transfer fee. If the competing funeral home shows no interest in picking up the body from the first funeral home, then possibly he is friends with them or have the same parent company. Go find another funeral home to transfer to. Often we can suggest a funeral home in your area.
The funeral home will charge you $6,000 to $15,000 for a typical funeral package. This includes a casket and funeral services. Usually their casket prices are 4x what ours are so it is always cheaper to buy the casket from us because we are a distributor and we sell to the funeral homes. Buy the funeral services from them. They are required to accept outside caskets and not charge anything to receive them. They are also required to give you a General Price List which is an individualized price sheet of all the funeral home caskets. If they do not give you an itemized list, you can report them to the Federal Trade Commission at 877-382-4357. See their web site for more details on the Funeral Rule at http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/buspubs/funeral.shtm
It’s similar to shopping for the best funeral home. Visit cemeteries that are further away and explain that you are shopping for the best price. They are way “out of the way” but you would bury there if the price is right. Often cemeteries make you buy a vault or grave liner which is the box which goes into the ground first and the casket goes inside of that. You will also have to pay open and closing fees (dig a hole for the casket).
Casket Emporium can work with you to ensure you get the casket you want for your loved one. If you would like to exchange your casket order for a different model, you can do so before it leaves our warehouse to avoid re-stocking fees and all shipping and handling charges incurred.
If you would like to return, exchange, or cancel your for any reason once the casket is in-transit or has been delivered, you may do so using the following process:
- Contact our customer support team to discuss your options and initiate the process.
- For cancellation requests, send a cancellation letter to contact@casketemporium.com
- It’s important to note that returning or exchanging a product will incur certain fees, including shipping and handling costs to the agreed upon ship-to location, a $295.00 return shipment cost, and a 25% restocking fee based on the original invoice amount.
- Upon receiving the product back at our warehouse location, Casket Emporium will process the refund within 7-10 business days, deducting any applicable fees.
- Please ensure that all returns are shipped and arrive at Casket Emporium no later than 10 days from the initiation of the cancellation letter.
- Kindly be aware that returns exceeding 10 days or return caskets with damage will not be accepted.
At Casket Emporium we make shipping easy. We charge a flat rate of $200.00 for next day casket delivery anywhere in the lower 48 states. Additional mileage charges of $2.95/mile may apply. For shipping questions, please give us a call so we can discuss options. If you are needing express shipping on a custom casket, call for details.
On-Time Delivery Across the United States
We at Casket Emporium strive to deliver your casket to most cities in the U.S. with next day delivery if requested. When you place an order, we will begin working immediately to deliver your casket. If you are dissatisfied with your order placement, Casket Emporium will work with you to remedy the situation.
Refusal of Acceptance
We cannot accept a used casket. By law if human remains have been placed in a casket for any amount of time, it is considered used and cannot be returned for any reason. We do not sell used caskets.
Limited Liability
Casket Emporium is not liable and shall be held harmless for any shipment delays due to inclement weather, acts of God, acts of war, governmental action, work stoppages, cargo refusal, and/or carrier delays.
