Sometimes logic works the best.
Early in my preneed career I tried to look for ways to understand what the best agents do, and then figure out how to mirror these practices. How do we best help people plan for the worst day of their life? We all know that death will occur. Although most don’t want to think about it, of course.
In my effort to make it easy, I ended up making my presentation harder. That’s when I started to use my own logic.
During my meetings with families, this the conversation I use to think about preplanning.
When you get married, you plan for a wedding. And even if you elope, someone had to put the proverbial ladder to the window. Either way, a married couple planned for at least three months for a wedding or a couple of days to elope.
When you were expecting the birth of a child.. planning went on for at least nine months. You thought about the baby’s room, what clothes it would wear, how to feed it, and how to be the best parent you could be.
When that child began school you tried to provide them at least 12 years of formal education. You planned how to get them out of bed. You planned school activities. Then finally you planned how to get them to graduation.
Then you can’t forget the holidays. For Easter you colored eggs, days before. Thanksgiving you cook the weekend before, pies, cakes and extras. For Christmas, shopping that starts the day after Christmas for the next year.
After using my own logic I look at the family and say, “We plan for everything in our life.
But yet we wait until the worst day of our life to make decision that will last forever. This planning period (death to interment) often is less than 4 hours, or 36 hours on average.”
