MEMORIALS Web site helps people send gifts for comfort

An entrepreneur offers ways to express sympathy besides flowers.
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
CHICAGO -- As a social worker in a neonatal intensive-care unit, Renee Wood became adept at comforting people in the throes of grief. She often would sit with families while their babies were being taken off life support.
But when her sister-in-law's father died unexpectedly, Wood was at a loss. She wanted to send something more than flowers, but she couldn't find a gift that seemed appropriate and lasting.
That started her thinking. If she was struggling to find a meaningful sympathy gift, others must be having the same problem.
"I was literally awake for four straight days when I started thinking about the possibilities. I couldn't sleep. I was pumped with adrenaline," Wood said.
From the basement of her west suburban home in Geneva, Wood launched The Comfort Co., an Internet-based retailer that sells everything from garden stepping stones to holiday remembrance ornaments.
She has now been in business for four years, and Comfort Co. is still a one-woman show. By the standards of big retailers, her sales are tiny, on target to exceed $100,000 this year.
But trend lines are promising. Last August she received 64 orders; this August she got more than 250 -- all with no advertising.
"I get up every morning and can't wait to get started," said the 39-year-old mother of four daughters.
Tradition
The more traditional way of acknowledging someone's death continues to be sending a card and flowers.
Americans send about 122 million sympathy cards annually, which represents about 6 percent of cards sent for nonholiday-related reasons, according to the Greeting Card Association.
Similarly, about 5 percent of flowers purchased outside the holidays are for funerals or memorials.
Hallmark, the largest greeting card company in America, also believes the sympathy industry is gaining ground. Sales of its sympathy cards rose 3 percent from 2002 to 2003, a trend the company expects to continue, said Jennifer McKenzie, a Hallmark product manager.
That would seem to augur well for Comfort Co., which is focused on a relatively new market: gifts that others can buy and send to show support for a grieving friend or relative.
"She is creating a market and, I would say, meeting what most people consider an unmet need," says Neil Stern, a retail consultant with Chicago's McMillan/Doolittle.
The Comfort Co.'s Web site (www.thecomfortcompany.net) is divided into a variety of categories including "miscarriage and infant loss," "pet loss" and "sympathy gifts for kids."
For those who have lost an unborn child or an infant, there is an assortment of 16 items, including a $37 hand-embroidered pillow with the phrase "Planted on earth to bloom in heaven" and several memorial garden stones ranging in price from $35 to $85. The $85 stone includes a metal plaque to be engraved with a name and dates.
Memorial stones and markers make up the gift assortment for grieving pet owners.
For children who have lost a family member, Comfort Co. offers a $25 kit to make their own memorial stone, a $40 chamois Teddy bear or a $16 "Angel Catcher" journal that encourages them to record their memories of the person who died.
Here's a concern
Wood is a little concerned about what customers might think about Comfort Co.'s earning a profit. So far, that hasn't been an issue because Wood hasn't taken a salary, choosing to plow excess revenue into buying equipment and creating new products. The cost of producing the holiday ornaments, for example, has hit $18,000.
"There goes the profit right there," she laughs.
But eventually, she knows the business will have to become profitable if it is to continue, something she very much wants so her daughters will have the option of taking it over someday.
The pressure to make money has become more intense in recent years as her husband's job prospects as a pilot for United Airlines have become more rocky.
Sometimes her husband teases Wood that she is making "five cents an hour," given all the time she puts in. But when there is another setback for United, it's a different story.
"He'll say, 'Are you hiring yet?'"