Cemeteries, Tourism, Media and Marketing

What happens when a park with a penchant for attracting tourists gets mixed with a media contest with good advertising, great food and exploding ideas that go back to basic Marketing 101? If done right you will find the latest concepts to turn cemeteries into the most chic places to visit, eat, be creative and buy gifts.

Just think of it, suppose a cemetery with some natural landscaping and some extra space decides to change itself from a place where only the bereaved dare to visit and into a hot spot for the trendy. Ok, lets start with thinking about how to convert this rather unexciting and dead (excuse the pun) area into one that attracts people, provides income, and becomes the place that everyone wants to go while they are still alive and kicking.

There are some very simple ideas that can make people get over their natural aversion of cemeteries. These ideas make cemeteries welcoming places that provide activities and opportunities to enjoy a family friendly place to visit. And, they help give people a sense of community, connection and belonging. Whether you are reading this as a cemetery owner, a person with special talents or someone who likes to volunteer there, are many opportunities to help your community and take pride in your work.

Our first suggestion is to call in the landscaping professionals. Find out which trees and plants are native to the area and how they could be placed to create a huge park or botanical garden. Make the cemetery look like a warm and friendly place; one that looks like a little bit of heaven on earth. If you already have staff, or you can get volunteers that can be used to help, then all you need to do is to go to a local university with an agricultural or horticultural program and solicit help for a detailed design. Then have the crew or volunteers plant the vegetation according to the plans. Often you can solicit the help of church groups and scout troops. Provide soft drinks and pizza or have a barbeque. Provide each volunteer with a nice certificate that you can create and print on your computer and have it signed by the owner of the cemetery or maybe get a local politician to give a short thank your speech and sign these or just hand them out. Politicians always like to do things that will give them face time and a positive community image. Give walking tours of the foliage and have the local horticulturalist, plant and tree nursery representative, or landscaping company representative explain what the different plants and tree are. Have this person give free classes on how and when to plant various types of plants and trees and other tips. Maybe even allow them to sell various seeds, bulbs or plants that they have talked about as part of the agreement.

Develop contests and activities that will attract people. Get a local artist to give free art lessons at the cemetery. The artist can hand out his/her business cards to get paying students if they want more advanced lessons. And allow the artist to also have a show gallery to display and sell his/her paintings, drawings and sculptures. Have popular photographers do the same. Go to local museums, universities or art galleries to find these people. Maybe have a photographer do the same types of things. The have contests. Award prizes of money or even donated gift cards or other prizes to the best in certain categories. Make part of the contest the right of the cemetery to use the photos, paintings, etc., on a royalty free basis. The take these and sell them as posters, both framed and unframed, and make an annual calendar. Now, Im not suggesting that the calendar will be as popular as an annual swimsuit calendar but a high quality calendar that is marketed correctly can be a real winner. Make sure that somewhere on the calendar you have a statement that all proceeds will go to a Friends of the Cemetery Fund for upkeep and further development of the cemetery and its activities. Make it a big annual event to get community involvement and recognition for the photos and paintings that are chosen to represent each month and for the sales of the calendars. And, have the area that you used to display the paintings and photos to become an art gallery with new showings monthly.

If there is unused space on the cemetery grounds talk with a local chef or restaurateur about building a restaurant on the property. Not a fast food place but a high quality restaurant that will be an attraction. The restaurant can be owned by the cemetery and leased to a local chef or restaurateur, it could be a joint venture or it could be completely owned by the chef or restaurateur with a long term ground lease with proper restrictions to protect the cemetery. It always amazes me when I go to a mall and suddenly the parking lot has development for a restaurant when I would never have believed that anything could ever be built in that space. And, if the restaurant is of good quality it almost always draws additional traffic to the mall. In the same way a good quality restaurant can attract people to the cemetery, its functions, gift shop and art gallery.

Train one or more of your current employees about the famous local people buried at the cemetery and about interesting local history. Have them give free walking tours which end at your gift shop or gallery. Give the people who went on the tour a discount coupon good only that day for anything they buy at the gift shop or gallery. Maybe work out a deal with a local acting troop or drama school to give lively presentations representing the people buried in the cemetery or dressed in period costumes to make the historical tour more interesting. Let them market and sell tickets for the tour that they will present and/or work with a local college to make it part of an internship for college credit. And at the end of the historical tour people can visit the gift shop or gallery. And with a high quality restaurant right on the property it seems like a logical place to stop for drinks, a meal and dessert.

Even smaller cemeteries can figure creative ways to attract people and raise it usability and visibility in the community. If done right, the cemetery will fulfill its potential to be a place of gathering, remembering and enjoying. Most of all, the concept must be genuine and add value to both the cemetery and the community.

Hal Stevens is President of CemeterySpot, Inc. http://www.cemeteryspot.com an online memorial website and author of The CemeterySpot blog http://www.cemeteryspot.com/blog. To schedule an interview, or discuss this article, please call Hal Stevens at 405-210-4363 or email Hal at hal@cemeteryspot.com .