13-08-2009, 05:24 PM
In a related story:
http://www.redorbit.com/news/health/1450...d_caskets/
"Obesity Creates Need for Oversized Caskets
Posted on: Wednesday, 20 April 2005, 00:00 CDT
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- When the funeral director saw the fat man in the small town, they engaged in some friendly banter about death. "You'd tell him, 'You're going to have to go on a diet. You've got to lose some of that weight," said John C. Rudder, owner of Rudder Funeral Home in Scottsboro.
"And he'd say 'Yeah, I know, you ain't got a box big enough to fit me.' ""And we didn't," Rudder said.
The solution when the man died: Order an oversized casket.
With an increasing number of Americans considered obese - including many in Alabama - funeral directors have been dealing with a big problem. Their caskets were not large enough.
Enter companies like Southern Heritage Casket Co. in Oxford, about 60 miles east of Birmingham. It's one of many firms across the nation that are pumping up the size of caskets to meet the needs of increasingly large people....
Costs can be higher, too. When an obese man died in July 2004, his family paid $3,250 for his casket alone, $600 more than it would have cost for a regular casket, Rudder said....
"We make very large oversize caskets. Oversized is kind of an understatement. They're 'supersized,' to coin a famous term," said Keith Davis, who owns the company with his wife, Julane Davis."
http://www.memorials.com/oversized-caskets.php
http://www.redorbit.com/news/health/1450...d_caskets/
"Obesity Creates Need for Oversized Caskets
Posted on: Wednesday, 20 April 2005, 00:00 CDT
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- When the funeral director saw the fat man in the small town, they engaged in some friendly banter about death. "You'd tell him, 'You're going to have to go on a diet. You've got to lose some of that weight," said John C. Rudder, owner of Rudder Funeral Home in Scottsboro.
"And he'd say 'Yeah, I know, you ain't got a box big enough to fit me.' ""And we didn't," Rudder said.
The solution when the man died: Order an oversized casket.
With an increasing number of Americans considered obese - including many in Alabama - funeral directors have been dealing with a big problem. Their caskets were not large enough.
Enter companies like Southern Heritage Casket Co. in Oxford, about 60 miles east of Birmingham. It's one of many firms across the nation that are pumping up the size of caskets to meet the needs of increasingly large people....
Costs can be higher, too. When an obese man died in July 2004, his family paid $3,250 for his casket alone, $600 more than it would have cost for a regular casket, Rudder said....
"We make very large oversize caskets. Oversized is kind of an understatement. They're 'supersized,' to coin a famous term," said Keith Davis, who owns the company with his wife, Julane Davis."
http://www.memorials.com/oversized-caskets.php