Customers can prepare for afterlife at Costco
Wholesale store sells coffins
BY ELLA NAYOR enayor@florida-weekly.com

SPECIAL TO FLORIDA WEEKLY Coffins from discount retailer Costco can be shipped to 26 states in the country including Florida.

Dying isn't quite what it used to be.

The days of seeing a funeral director in a dark, pin stripe suit showing a grief-stricken family around a showroom of caskets and embellished urns are seemingly passé.

Now folks can peruse stores like global wholesale retailer Costco and online sites such as EBay to buy a coffin.

And right here in Southwest Florida lies the opportunity to buy your own casket - just in case.

At Costco in Naples customers can scope out the casket of their choice at a kiosk dedicated just to coffins. The Fort Myers' stores offer information about how to buy direct on line, said assistant store manager Kristin McCluskey.

To date no one has inquired about caskets at Costco in Fort Myers, according to McCluskey.

But not so in the Naples location. There, membership and marketing associate Cindy Cordero fields questions and information requests on a frequent basis.

And buying caskets for some is apparently not much different then buying any other kind of commodity or supply.

In one case Cordero said she spoke with a father and daughter who were very interested in buying a casket.

And what's the deal with casket shopping anyway? For most folks, casket shopping trips don't usually register high on the fun things to do on a Saturday afternoon list.

It comes down to dollars and cents.

Places like Costco can slash prices of the traditionally high priced after-life receptacles from what many funeral homes charge.

"It's a fraction of the cost," McClusky said.

According to US-funerals.com, funeral homes can mark up caskets more than 600 percent of their cost. These prices, which can reach $5,000, could financially strap a family too heart-broken over the loss of a loved one to consider shopping for a better deal on a casket.

But at Costco, a customer can buy a casket for as low as $799.99 - all in the comfort of their own home via online. Applications are available in Naples at the casket kiosk.

And as far as quality and aesthetics go, Costco features a variety of types and quality.

"They're very nice looking," McCluskey said.

The caskets come in a variety of colors such as soothing slate blues and delicate lilac. For more posh tastes there is the Argos Cherry Casket which features a premium beige velvet interior, memorial and record tube and swing bar handles. It sells for $2,999.99.

And for the more feminine person's in one's life there is the Kentucky Rose casket with pink crepe interior.

The caskets are available in different lengths and sizes as well.

And since there will always be a demand for caskets, the business is kept under tight tabs by the Federal Trade Commission.

The FTC makes sure that folks are not being ripped off or told by funeral homes that they cannot purchase caskets elsewhere.

According to the Funeral Consumer Alliance, a recent FTC staff opinion made on July 18 says that that funeral homes cannot charge consumers extra for storing a casket that the consumer bought from outside the funeral home, and funeral homes can't charge extra to dispose of the packaging material from the outside casket.

Choices for caskets tend to be based on individual taste and cost.

According to US-funerals.com, prices of Caskets vary greatly based upon their composition and hardware. The cost of a casket may vary from a minimal amount for a fiberboard item to thousands of dollars for a sounder constructed casket.

Wooden Caskets can be constructed from a variety of woods such as pine, walnut, cherry, mahogany or oak. Pine is usually the least expensive and rarely on display in funeral homes for this reason.

Metal caskets can be composed of bronze, copper or stainless steel construction. Bronze and copper constructed caskets are priced by weight per square foot. Stainless steel caskets are categorized by their thickness or gauge.

It is important to note that regardless of the casket's features there are no guarantees about how long or how well the remains will preserve inside them. Items like gaskets and seals tend to drive up the price of the coffin rather than hold any benefit.

But when it comes down to it, death like taxes is not going away. Either are the containers used to support the afterlife needs.

So if you are looking for a good deal in preparing for the next world it might be close as your neighborhood Costco.

And in case you were wondering what its like to work surrounded by caskets all day?

It seems it's like anything else. "You just get used to them being there," Cordero said.