Funeral Invitations and Funeral Favours!

[Robin60]

I’ve recently been helping a friend organise a funeral and don’t know if the funeral director is on trend (!) or taking advantage of those in a vulnerable position. We were offered formal invitations, thank you letters and favours - very similar to those offered for a wedding. I have been to a number of funerals and have never received a formal invitation or a thank you let alone a funeral favour! And would never expect one either. If you didn’t know funeral favours are in the form of a pin in a design of your choice.
Is this something any of you have come across and what are your thoughts?

My dads funeral I arranged and was somewhat weirded out of all the things offered and actually a little pissed off. It's just money making, horrible money making when people are at their most vulnerable.
Just find something that was significant to the person who has passed if want to do something and quite easily arrange without paying over the odds for the funeral home to do it.

Catholic commemorative funeral cards / booklet with the name, date time, place, etc, a prayer inside and a photo of the deceased.

Never received 'funeral favours.'

I like that.

My DH died recently and his funeral is in a couple of weeks. My DDs and I have each chosen to have a piece of jewellery made with a tiny amount of his ashes. I love the idea that we will be able to keep him around with us in that way. It feels right somehow. You don't have to do it via the funeral director though. You can contact the company directly.

We haven't used invitations for DH's funeral although I think I did see some in a catalogue of stuff provided by the funeral director. We have just let all interested parties know when and where.

That's kind of sweet. I'm guessing Granddad was a fair age so his funeral was absolutely a celebration of his life.

Programme usually called the Order of Service

Op I'd find it a bit weird to get a favour at a funeral and I don't see any need for invites.

We are in the 21st century, text messages and WhatsApp are things.
Favours would end up in a drawer or the bin.

I tend to keep Orders of Services usually for the photos but nobody would wear a pin badge with the deceased

Oh I received a lovely favour at a funeral - nothing fancy, just a little silver heart in a bag with a tag that had a nice saying typical of our friend who died.

I’d like to give a small token for people to remember me by.

I also received Forget Me Not seeds at another which I also really liked and planted on the 1st anniversary - more because I’d forgotten until then, but still, the little pot on my kitchen windowsill and the growing flowers felt like a nice thing.

Seems I’m just a sucker for a favour 😆

Oh although not sure about actual invites - I might send a select few un-invitations mind you…

He was in his 70s, not old at all really.

Tacky

Do you mean in a church? My husband's funeral was in the crematorium and it definitely was not public.

Thanks for all your input, I honestly wasn’t sure if I was so out of touch but you have reassured me that funeral favours and invites are a no no.
However, I do love the idea of something that will absolutely remind you of your loved one whether it’s sweets, seeds, selecting a photo etc.

We had orders of service for both my parent’s funerals and also little envelopes of forget me nots for my mum. My sister organised those. I’ve been to funerals where they had no order of service, no flowers and no eulogy. They were particularly sad as it seemed like no one could be bothered to make the funeral personal.

There's a Catholic tradition of a prayer card in memory of the deceased.

I attended a funeral a couple of years ago and they gave out packets of forget me nots. Which was nice. I scattered them in my 'wild' garden area.
We didn't give anything out at my mums funeral- we just had the standard order of service and let everyone know by telephone and/or text. We also had a funeral notice in the paper.
Its handy to get a rough estimate of who is coming for catering though. Although not everyone who attends the service comes to the wake.

I hate anything to do with death, hate thinking about it, talking about it etc…but the last thing I ever want is everyone morbid at my funeral. When im older, will make it clear there is only to be colour (not a fan of black) and fun music! The last thing I want is my family thinking there’s strict rules. I want my kids to smile with happy memories more than they cry.

Didn’t read all the replies but saw someone mentioned seeds to give out. That’s a lovely idea especially if the person loved gardening/flowers and I can see my own parents liking this idea.

Perhaps by making funerals less morbid (I am talking generally about people living a good long life - I know there’s many circumstances where it is impossible for it to be a celebration), then the fear of death and the thought of it being so awful may be slightly less scary.

Agree with this.

I want my funeral to be a celebration of my life - we’re all so lucky to get our chance on earth. I love the idea of a small token that lives on.

Never heard of either! I did go to a friend's funeral and the guests were asked to take one of her many Christmas baubles (she had 100s) and hang it on your tree in memory of her- it was a December funeral. Other than that, I've never had a 'favour' or receive an invite.

My name is died 19 years ago and at her funeral I gave out CD/dvds with all of her family photos that is scanned over the last 3 months as I had no idea who lots of the photos were of. I’d numbered the b photos and provided my email and address and lots of People got back to me with things like #12 was taken outside X pub and it’s Dave, frank and val from the jam factory around 1952 . I got tons of info and filled in lots of gaps and everybody absolutely loved seeing the photos on the screen at the pub after the church . But pins? Invitations? Nah

We gave out favours at my dad's funeral and it was not crass or tacky or tat. We made them ourselves, supervised by my mum who managed to get through the traumatic loss of her husband by focusing on making the funeral as nice as she could possibly make it. She wanted favours so we made favours, they were little packets of seeds with a suncatcher charm attached. We'd have pretty much done anything to support her and if threading what felt like a million bits of coloured glass onto strings and pouring seeds into little personalised envelopes was what it took, then we did it.

Behind every judgement of crass or tacky is a family who are grieving and who are trying to put on what they perceived to be a respectable funeral. It's the last thing they'll ever do for their loved one.

Same for invitations, it's up to be family and is no different to someone specifying that a funeral is family-only or requesting no children or even no mourners at all. It's just a way of communicating funeral details and preferences.

If you want your own funeral done a specific way, then leave instructions. You can say no favours, no invitations.

I have seen a packet of a few bulbs to plant in memory of the person I thought it was rather nice.

I hate how other people judge what other people do to remember their loved ones. If it brings them comfort then keep your judgey nose out.

If we are generalising away from the opening post, then I can't agree with this.

I judge to the height of judginess when people do those selfish balloon releases.
They should be made illegal.

Nope. No invitations needed for a funeral and favours are in poor taste in my opinion (not some of the examples here of homemade tokens that are small reminders of the deceased as opposed to stupid tat). Yeah fleecing money off people who are already grieving and highly vulnerable is disgusting.

How very MN you are.