Finding My Feet in Funeralcare
When I was 16 and in the few years following, I happened to attend a number of family funerals and had the realisation that funeralcare is a job that people do. At that age, there's a level of pressure from teachers and elders to decide on a career path and start chasing it. I always knew I wanted to be a writer, but I also knew that that would take a stroke of luck, and I didn't know what I would do in the meantime. It wasn't initially grief which inspired me to pick this path, nor was it a morbid curiosity. The first appeal was probably the traditionalism: having always had a love for all things olde worlde (especially historical costume), to see a man in a top hat, holding a cane, walking slowly in front of a black hearse, with the utmost respect and dignity, was staggering.
A few years later, losing my uncle at 18 and my nanna and gran at 20, I developed a lived experience of grief and felt the weight of how important it would be to help people through that. I read my own poetry at all three of those funerals, and it only brought me more personal peace and professional interest to be involved in those funerals that way. My dream of being a funeral director was still holding strong, and was clearly never just a phase like any of the other careers I'd considered.
Being involved in the planning and organising of my nanna and gran's funerals, I also realised there's an another element to funeralcare: the arranging side of things. Not many people consider funerals as events, but ultimately they are. Funeral arrangers work like any event planner: find out what the client wants, book the event and sort the logistics, then orchestrate everything else to slide into place and be ready for the day. As an avid planner, who loves to organise literally anything, this was another big reason why I wanted this career. It's event planning with so much heart and soul, arranging one of the most important days in a family's life, and hopefully making an incredibly difficult process that little bit easier for them.
I started by emailing some local funeral directors and asking them if I could gain some work experience over the summer holidays between my first and second years of university. Unfortunately, they all said no because the Covid-19 pandemic was just kicking off and the near future looked very uncertain. I parked that for the next few years and focussed on my studies. After I finished university, I started applying for jobs in funeralcare and emailing funeral homes once again, looking for paid work this time. I landed an interview, but the role was back-of-house heavy, and I was desperate to arrange face to face with families and be front-of-house. I turned down that job offer and hoped I wouldn't regret the decision. In the meantime, I was able to secure a week of work experience at Woodlands Crematorium in Scunthorpe, which gave me endless insider knowledge and was something I could really talk about in interviews. Not long after, I got an interview for Co-op Funeralcare in Leeds, as a funeral arranger. I tried my hardest to smash it. When the wait was over and I got the verdict, it was bad news. I didn't get the job. But... they offered me a different one instead. That's how I became the mobile funeral arranger for Leeds.
As mobile funeral arranger, I worked at 12 different funeral homes around Leeds, covering when other arrangers were on holiday or off sick. During busy periods, I juggled multiple homes at once to support colleagues and ensure we were always there when families needed us. I managed my own schedule, deciding where needed me most, and worked with other colleagues to make sure all funeral homes were covered. My role extended to assisting with the arrangements of 'contract' funerals, where our client was either the hospital or adult social care. I was also certified to sell funeral plans: I received referrals from my colleagues, booked appointments with the clients, and travelled round all the funeral homes to make the sales.
I loved this role. It was my first ever full-time job, and I made it my mission to always do my best and take pride in my work. My goal was to secure my own funeral home, so I wouldn't be travelling round as much and could see each funeral through from start to finish, but in the meantime I really was content with being mobile.
After 10 months as the mobile arranger, a position opened up and I got my own funeral home. I became the full-time funeral arranger in Garforth, Leeds. Finally, I could make myself at home a little bit, get to know families as it was always me who picked up the phone, and gain experience looking after a branch.
In this role, I stayed in the same funeral home all day, every day. Monitoring emails, answering the phone, facilitating visits to the chapel of rest, meeting with families to go through their wishes or update them on progress, and release loved ones' ashes to families at the end. My favourite part of the job though was booking the funerals, working out the logistics, ordering the flowers and other items, getting all the little details ready and completing all the related admin. Ticking all the tasks off one by one, getting it right for the family, and seeing everything come together was rewarding and, honestly, satisfying. It could be stressful at times, and emotions were always high, but to hear back from the funeral director on the day and find out it all went according to plan, and the family got the goodbye they needed, made it worth it.
I didn't have my spot as funeral arranger in Garforth for very long though, as I was asked to step up and direct funerals only six weeks later. Keep an eye on this blog for the next part of my story.