SCI forced to sell funeral homes

Two East Aurora funeral homes are changing corporate owners as part of a larger divestiture by the nation?s largest funeral home company after a major acquisition.

Houston-based Service Corporation International has sold the Kenneth Howe and Froehley-Dengler funeral homes in East Aurora to Foundation Partners Group LLC of Tampa, Fla.

The local funeral homes were part of a deal that includes 23 funeral homes and five cemeteries in 13 states.

The price was not disclosed, but the Kenneth Howe property was acquired for $340,000 last week, according to Erie County Clerk?s office records.

?Our organization is built on a commitment to the families we serve and the individuals who take care of those families,? Foundation Partners CEO Steve Shaffer said in a news release announcing the deal. ?We are so proud to be teaming up with the people at these affiliated locations to continue the heritage of exceptional service they provide to their communities.?

SCI, the largest provider of funeral and cemetery services in North America, was directed by the Federal Trade Commission to sell 22 funeral homes and cemeteries with $19 million in combined revenues as a condition of the FTC?s approving its larger purchase of rival Keystone North America, also in Tampa.

That bigger deal, completed in March, added 199 funeral homes and 15 cemeteries in 31 states and Ontario to SCI?s roster, giving the company more than 1,500 funeral homes and 400 cemeteries in 46 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and eight Canadian provinces. The purchase included several funeral homes in Western New York.

Foundation Partners was founded this year by three former Keystone executives specifically to buy those properties and start a new national company. In addition to the 22 divested properties and another that SCI chose to sell, Foundation Partners also bought Aldor Solutions, a funeral home software company that Keystone had acquired in May 2009.

Both Kenneth Howe and Froehley-Dengler were owned by SCI prior to the merger, not by Keystone, said Kenneth Howe location manager Frank Cagnina.

Source: Buffalo News