There’s a touch of oddity in a mortuary winning recognition for longevity.
The operators of O’Connor Mortuary of Laguna Hills took it in stride when they were honored with the longevity award at the annual Family Owned Business luncheon put on by the Business Journal and California State University, Fullerton’s Family Business Council.
The event was held Nov. 17 at the Hyatt Regency Irvine.
The company bills itself as the oldest family owned and run mortuary in California, serving Southern California for 107 years.
The O’Connors employ 27 people and serve about 1,000 clients each year, generating some $4 million in annual revenue.
A typical funeral home does 187 services per year, with five workers and roughly $1 million in annual revenue, according to the Brookfield, Wis.-based National Funeral Directors Association.
In the past few years, HBO’s “Six Feet Under” and A & E;’s “Family Plots” have taken the O’Connor’s business out of the shadows, portraying families within the funeral business.
The O’Connors said they watch both shows on occasion, sometimes with rolling eyes.
“The media has never been kind to our industry,” said Chuck Ricciardi, O’Connor’s chief operating officer.
Ricciardi, who married into the O’Connor family, said he thinks the shows demystify what morticians do.
For Chief Financial Officer Joe Fitzgerald, the programs serve as an icebreaker in social settings.
“Normally, when you say you’re a mortuary owner, people don’t know what to say next,” he said.
The shows portray the business as too chaotic, according to Chief Executive Neil O’Connor.
Passed on TV
A & E; sought out the O’Connors when it was readying “Family Plots” for prime time, he said.
“They probably thought we were too boring and well-run,” O’Connor joked.
The O’Connors have had their brushes with fame, conducting services for Clark Gable, Gary Cooper, Bing Crosby, Spencer Tracy and even John Wayne.
The family declined to talk about any more recent celebrities, citing confidentiality.
“You have to be dead for several decades to get mentioned on our Web site,” O’Connor joked.
The O’Connors work with hospitals, hospice workers, trauma teams and emergency medical technicians.
They provide grief counseling, funeral planning and other services.
Family members still follow their great-grandfather’s mission to treat families as if they were O’Connors.
That doesn’t make them stuffy.
The O’Connors describe themselves as a family with a good sense of humor.
“Dad taught us we’re here to serve others and trust is the most important (component) of doing that,” O’Connor said.
O’Connor, still in his 30s, represents the fourth generation running the business. He’s the youngest son of Joseph O’Connor Jr. and one of seven siblings involved in the business.
In all, about 85% of U.S. mortuaries are family businesses.
“The funeral business is such a personal relationship business, it doesn’t lend itself easily to franchising,” said Mark Mosgrove, past president of the National Funeral Directors Association and co-owner of cemeteries and funeral homes in the Eugene, Ore., area.
The mortuary business is something few people discuss.
Many think of it as dark, mysterious or morbid. They think of squeaky caskets and Jason returning time and again in “Friday the 13th.” They think of strange men in black.
The O’Connors lead very normal lives.
They come from the military, commercial real estate, the restaurant industry and city administration.
They surf, do yoga, play volleyball, go boating, plant gardens and have family barbecues.
Fitzgerald’s children were born when the family lived in the funeral home.
He said it’s such a normal part of their lives that they end up educating classmates who ask them questions based on horror movies.
It’s a far cry from the somewhat dysfunctional Fisher family on “Six Feet Under.”
According to the funeral association, trends for mortuaries include grief counseling, remembrance services, pre-planned funerals and personalized services that cater to a variety of customs.
They’re trends that the O’Connors address.
Pat Kolstad heads up community relations, helping with grief resource programs and workshops for care-giving professionals and volunteers.
Family members also support Rotary, Kiwanis, Lions and the Family Business Council at Cal State Fullerton.
“We want to be partners on life issues, too,” O’Connor said.
Mortuary tours aren’t on travel itineraries. But the family does tours of the mortuary and the crematorium to explain the process.
“There are no secrets,” Ricciardi said. “We want people to understand it.”
Americans tend to be among the least comfortable when it comes to talking about funeral plans.
“Even in our own family, it’s still difficult for us to talk about these things,” Ricciardi said.
Mortuary representatives meet with families to explain their options. If the funeral plans are part of estate planning, they’ll go to the client’s home for the meeting.
Inevitable Service
“We emphasize that this planning will be used, as opposed to life insurance or car insurance that might be used,” Ricciardi said.
Few members of O’Connor Mortuary’s current management know the precise circumstances that launched the family’s Irish immigrant ancestors into the death business.
Family legend has it that Thomas Cunningham and Patrick O’Connor knew each other simply because they both were immigrants. Cunningham had a prior mortuary partnership that fell apart and asked O’Connor to join him.
O’Connor borrowed a few thousand dollars and jumped into the venture.
The younger generation suspects he did so in part because the Irish,not always welcome immigrants at the turn of the 20th century,had few job prospects at the time.
The first mortuary opened in downtown Los Angeles in 1906. Even then they were innovators, replacing a barn for horses that had drawn hearses with a garage for the automobiles.
The company’s stationery displayed a photo of the building followed by the caption, “Importers of Fine Burial Cases Complete With Irish Linen Interiors.”
In 1942, a new, larger mortuary opened on Washington Boulevard in Los Angeles. Another opened in Hollywood in 1950.
By 1960, Joseph A. O’Connor Jr., grandson of the founder, returned from the Navy, joined the family business and became a managing partner.
In the 1970s, the O’Connors wanted to grow the company by expanding to Orange County. The other partners didn’t share the vision, Neil O’Connor said.
So Joseph O’Connor Jr., who had vacationed in Laguna Beach, headed south, found land in then-rural Laguna Hills and opened the mortuary in 1975.
“The other factor was that Leisure World already existed,” Ricciardi said. “It didn’t take a brain surgeon to figure out that would be a good place to locate.”
