Huddersfield Funeral Home 'Open Day' piped in to great success

Huddersfield Daily Examiner

AS a Scottish piper played, the sun started to shine and the day’s events began at St. Thomas’s Road, Huddersfield.

The whole team at ‘Huddersfield Funeral Home’ looked very smart in their company uniforms. The building stood proud in its lovely gardens and inside there was a unique display of coffins and caskets.

A coffin in the shape of a canal narrow boat was the star attraction and was one of the things most talked about, along with a coffin in the colours of Huddersfield Town F C., when the ‘Huddersfield Funeral Home’ opened its doors last Saturday to all and had an ‘Open Day’ at its premises on St. Thomas’s Road, where it has been situated since 1937.

Lots of people accepted the well publicised open invitation to look around the funeral home and the event was successful in attracting people from all around the district.

As part of ‘Funeral Partners Limited’, Mr Barry Pritchard (Operations Director) said:“I am delighted with the response that we have had here today. We wanted to let the people of Huddersfield and the surrounding areas see for themselves the choices of services that are now available.

“I am proud to be part of the team here at the Huddersfield Funeral Home where every member of the team has a wealth of experience and always works to the highest standards of service and company values”.

As well as invited guests there were displays and the chance to talk to the experts about pre-payment funeral plans, memorial masonry, the Birkby based Rose Hill natural burial ground, a civil ceremony, cremated remains being used in fireworks and rockets as well as a sculptress offering unique pieces of art from locally sourced, reclaimed timber.

Keith Clegg, the Manager of the Funeral Home said “It’s great to meet with all these people as we are all working together to offer help and advice in a time of need. We have people here today who have come to ask about job opportunities within the company, representatives from nursing homes, others, including families with young children, just to look around and even a lady who wanted to look in great depth at our coffin range so she could state which coffin she was to have when taking out a pre-paid funeral plan”.

Among other items on display were a selection of coffins from the ‘Crazy Coffins’ range including ones shaped like a skip and another like a Rolls Royce car. As previously mentioned, there was also a coffin on display bearing the colours and logo of Huddersfield Town Football Club.

Football Club coffins are something that are now becoming more and more popular among all age groups.

On display in the car park were a range of vehicles from the past to the present. Two beautiful black Friesian horses stood perfectly as if on parade at the palace. They were under control and ready for work, yes work! as they spend their lives pulling an old Victorian styled horse drawn hearse.

Also exhibited was a motorcycle hearse and a 73 year old Austin A30. As the day drew to a close the horse drawn hearse closely followed by a motorcycle hearse, the vintage car and the modern funeral fleet went on a parade through the streets of Huddersfield town centre.

Because of the success of the day it is hoped that the event will become an annual one.