Matt Blackwell on 
If you’re an independent funeral home or cemetery owner, tracking public company performance might seem like something only Wall Street cares about. But the truth is, these companies influence the entire profession, especially when it comes to how buyers think, how valuations are framed, and what success looks like in today’s market.
At Foresight, we maintain a quarterly model that tracks the two dominant public players in the funeral profession: Service Corporation International (SCI) and Carriage Services (CSV). We analyze their financials, monitor their growth, and benchmark their performance against trends we see across the country.
The goal isn’t to mimic every move they make. It’s to study what’s working, what’s not, and use it as a reference point for private business owners who want to grow, transition, or better understand their own value.
What the Data Reveals
We track dozens of performance metrics—financial, operational, and structural—but a few clear trends stand out:
- Revenue per call continues to increase, even after the COVID spike. Both SCI and CSV are averaging 1.4% to 1.6% compound annual growth over the past few years.
- SCI’s preneed conversion rate is notably higher, resulting in a preneed backlog nearly four times larger than CSV’s on a revenue basis. This isn’t just about sales, it’s about follow-through.
- Despite this backlog gap, CSV is trying to catch up, now selling roughly 1.5 preneed contracts for every at-need, the same pace as SCI.
A Playbook for Independents
Public companies are required to disclose everything: revenue, margins, staffing costs, marketing spend, and how their business is structured. For independent owners, this is a unique opportunity. You can use their disclosures as a playbook, a real-world operating manual showing what works at scale.
- What kind of margins are buyers aiming for?
- How much do top operators invest in staffing and facilities?
- What revenue trends are they seeing per call, per location?
When you ask questions like these and compare them to your own operation, you start to see where there may be room to improve and where you might already be ahead of the curve.
Expense Benchmarks That Matter
We regularly break down public company spending categories like:
- Salaries and benefits as a percentage of revenue
- Facility and occupancy costs
- Capital Expenditures
- General and administrative costs
This gives independent owners a lens into where their cost structure may be high or lean, and whether it’s supporting long-term profitability.
If your business is significantly off benchmark in key areas, it may be hurting your margins, or your valuation.
Valuation Benchmarks: Not a Mirror, But a Window
We often use public company performance as a benchmark when discussing valuations. Not because a single-location funeral home should be valued the same way as a national brand, but because it helps put scale into perspective.
If SCI is trading at a certain multiple, it gives us a high-water mark. It shows what happens when operations are consistent, efficient, and repeatable at scale. For independent owners, this provides a way to reverse engineer value: If that’s where the ceiling is, what steps can you take to climb higher?
What Happens Next
We update this model quarterly, and use it to shape our valuations, our strategic guidance, and our industry outlooks. If you want to see how your business compares or where the most valuable upgrades might be, we’re happy to walk you through it.
Because knowing what the biggest operators are doing makes it a lot easier to build something that lasts.