I read about Dan Symonds and immediately thought: I need to meet this guy.
Symonds is a second-generation funeral director running Symonds Family Chapels out of Elgin, IL. He grew up playing in the chapels, lived upstairs as a kid, and today lives upstairs at his Elgin location with his own family. His kids ride bikes in the parking lot in the winter, after Dan himself clear’s the driveway of snow, no doubt. His father bought his first funeral home before Dan was born, and Dan describes what he does now with a line that stopped me: “I don’t look at what I own here as mine. I’m just the current steward who is getting it ready for the next generation.”
That is a philosophy, and it shows up in everything he does.
He recently acquired a small community funeral home handling roughly 80 cases a year. The previous owner had been in the community for 50 years and was explicit about what he wanted: someone who would run the place and keep it community-based, not a corporation that would close it down. Symonds was that person.
He lets families take 30 days to pay a balance if they need it. He has served homeless veterans with full military honors, funded by nothing more than a belief that every veteran deserves a dignified farewell regardless of their bank account. One of those services drew 600 people and every TV station in the area. That grew into an annual initiative called Operation LOVE, honoring unclaimed veterans. Symonds served over 20 years in the U.S. Army Reserve, including five tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, retiring as a first sergeant. He knows what he is honoring.
He also reinvests in his buildings, because as he told families who complimented how the place looked: if you do not take care of the space, how are you going to take care of the families?
All of this matters more right now because of what is happening on the other end of the industry.
Landmark Funeral Group, backed by Brenton Point Capital Partners, just acquired nine locations across Kentucky and Indiana, bringing their total to 38. Their stated strategy is to acquire and consolidate funeral homes, crematories, and cemeteries across Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Western Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. That is a significant footprint, and they are far from alone in pursuing it.
The NFDA counts 15,401 funeral homes in the United States right now. The Foresight Companies suggest that roughly 46% of owners will sell or transition within 5 to 10 years. Dan Isard’s 2021 projections put about 35% of those sales going to public or private equity investors. That is a lot of funeral homes moving into consolidation models over the next decade.
And here is what consolidation tends to produce over time. When you grow by acquisition at that pace, maintaining a consistent culture and personality across locations becomes genuinely difficult. Each satellite starts as some version of the original brand it once represented. Over time it becomes a vague echo of that, not really part of any coherent identity that runs through the whole organization. The place can start to feel lifeless in a way that has nothing to do with the funeral directors working there. It is structural.
The independent family funeral home, run the way Dan Symonds runs his, can grow and innovate and become a more and more complete expression of what it was always trying to be. The community connection deepens rather than dilutes. The personality sharpens. The reputation compounds.
Simmons Funeral Homes is another example worth watching. They are expanding in ways that are creative, family-centered, and genuinely elegant, building something that gets more itself with each step rather than more generic.
There will always be a market for the consolidators. The economics are real and the acquisition wave is not stopping. But the independent homes that keep reinvesting, keep showing up for veterans with no one else to call, keep letting grieving families breathe for 30 days before worrying about a balance, those homes are building something the equity rollup cannot replicate on a spreadsheet.
Stewardship is the word Dan Symonds used. I think he is exactly right about what it means.
-John
PS. Call me anytime at the VIP desk in Madison: 608-845-2252. If I’m here, I always pickup :)
Sources
Brenton Point Capital-Backed Landmark Funeral Group Acquires Nine-Location Funeral Excellence Group in Kentucky and Indiana
https://funeraldirectordaily.com/landmark-funeral-group-adds-9-locations/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=landmark-funeral-group-adds-9-locationsIndependent Funeral Director Dan Symonds Discusses Acquisition, Community Identity and Operations at Symonds Family Chapels
https://connectingdirectors.com/independent-funeral-home-legacy-dan-symonds/