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Death Be Not Pricey

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"Prearrange, prearrange," said Laurie. "See, I know I'm going to live another 45 years, and when I go, I'm going to be laughing. Because what's it going to be then -- $50,000? Who can afford that?"

The purpose of the Texas Funeral Service Commission is to protect consumers, said Chairman Dick McNeil. But if you show up with a complaint, he won't be glad to see you.

"It gets downright insulting sometimes," the chairman said. "I just wish someone could be kind to us every once in a while."

A Fort Worth undertaker, he defended the funeral industry for two hours over the telephone, with rarely a question to prod him along. He and his fellow board members always grant customers with grievances their time to complain, he said. Then, after they're done, the board quite often answers, "Well, we find nothing wrong." And that's that.

McNeil doesn't think these customers are lying, necessarily; more often, he said, they're "just mad at God." Or, not having bought a funeral recently, they can also be startled at the prices. McNeil had never heard of Lambert, but he agreed funerals were expensive, like everything else these days. The industry was "surviving," but there were so many bills....

There were gas bills, electricity bills. "You have to clean the facilities," he said. There were limos and hearses to buy. There was the cost of complying with "all sorts of demands" from regulatory agencies. Rattling off a list of these agencies, he omitted his own. (Of those he mentioned, the funeral customer is protected only by the Federal Trade Commission, whose rules are widely thought to have been gutted.)

McNeil went on: The mortuary has to buy fans to disperse formaldehyde fumes. There was the cost of protecting the funeral director against great peril -- smocks, masks, goggles and double gloves to guard against hepatitis, AIDS and "a strain of tuberculosis that's incurable right now."

It was also quite expensive to train the funeral director in grief therapy. Many funeral homes assume this burden as a public service. "Grief that is shared is grief that is diminished," said McNeil.

Lastly, there was the undertaker's salary to consider. It might come to several hundred thousand dollars a year -- all of which he earns. He works hard, he sacrifices. Most of all, your neighborhood funeral director cares about you. McNeil said he had given his life to funeral service. "A ministry to the people," he called it.

"I'm not trying to sit around here and bark bark bark about poor us," he said, "but we all have to stand up for what we believe. We have to do what we think is correct and right."

Sir Ken came to the rescue on the August day that Katharine Rushing found her mother dead. In tears, Rushing sat beside the bed and painted her mother's nails ("Mom always liked her nails to look good"). And when she was done, she called the Funeral Shopper.

Thrift was a way of life for her mother, and Rushing saw no reason to change after death. Rushing had seen Lambert's ad the year before in a senior citizens' publication, and had clipped it, as she would a coupon, for future use. With his help now, she knew where to send the body for inexpensive preparation. She bought a cheap casket and even had it painted to match her mother's dress. "And believe me," she said, "I got a good buy on my flowers."

The service was held in a chapel at SCI's Forest Park East. Rushing's mother went out "in class," and without costing an arm and a leg. By using Lambert's contractors, Rushing figures she shaved $4,000 from the Forest Park bill. For this, she owed Lambert $350.

"You couldn't find a nicer man to work with," said Rushing. "Like I say, I still haven't paid him a cent."

Lambert's customers are generally pleased with their savings. His "Comment Book" is as full of gratitude as his bank account is empty of money. Can't pay now, one customer wrote, but "God bless you." "Dear Ken," wrote another, "Sorry this payment was a while coming." "Never expected to save this much," wrote a third. "Allowed me to make a contribution to our church."

Lambert, meanwhile, plunges deeper into debt -- $70,000, the last he knew. The problem seems to lie not so much with his customers, but with his company. He has an unusual way of doing business.

He makes no follow-up calls, not even when the customer requests it. ("We do not do high-pressure sales.") He charges nothing in advance, but instead dispenses his information freely, hoping customers will call back after the funeral. If they do, he asks them for 10 percent of what they saved, usually discounting that, always giving them ten months to pay. If after ten months they haven't made good, he crosses his fingers and hopes they will. But if they say they don't want to pay, that's okay, too.

"We are a Christian business," a flier attests. "We want to help you. We will help whether you pay us or not."

More than a Christian business, Funeral Shoppers resembles a Christian charity. Lambert will take your donation if you give it, but he'll still bless your soul if you don't. On the telephone, he often asks callers if they're intimate with Jesus. If the answer is no, "Hold on!" he'll say. "The funeral is the least of your concerns." Because you're headed for the fires of hell, you know, and Lambert has never yet found an air-conditioned casket.

Saving money and saving souls -- he can't imagine a job better than his own. His wife might consider a job with a salary an improvement, but late in life, she has found herself married to a crusader, and there's nothing she can do. With three children in college, Lambert keeps pouring borrowed money into his sinking business. What kind of Christian, she wonders, takes care of other families before his own? Lambert's answer is simple: a Christian who sees family as his third priority, behind God and fellow man.

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