Exclusive: First Look at Batesville's Burial Vault Graveside Set Up

Last December we reported that Batesville Casket Company (parent company Hillenbrand) bought the Goria Burial Vault company. We also reported in July that Batesville ran job ads on CareerBuilder.com and in local Cincinnati, Ohio and Louisville, Kentucky newspapers looking for Diver/Burial Vault Sales Representative, confirming speculation that Batesville was planning to service their own burial vaults and further solidifying that Batesville was taking burial vaults very seriously.

Yesterday I received an email from an Ohio funeral director who went to one of the Batesville distribution plants in Ohio to pick up a casket. While at the distribution plant he was given a sneak peek at the graveside set up Batesville is testing in Ohio, Indiana, and parts of Kentucky.

There isn’t anything really special about the set up. A few things that I noticed are:

They are only using a 15’x15′ tent. Other vault companies in the testing area use 15’x20′ tents

There are only 4 chairs. Most graveside set ups in Ohio use at least 6 chairs

There is a speaker stand, so they must be including a mic system for the preacher or funeral director to use.

I do like how the lid is displayed

The funeral director also told me that the tent displayed the funeral home name as well.

It looks like Batesville made some changes to the look of the vault. The original Eonian made by Goria did not have such a raised lid.

It also looks like the vault is going to seal with screws much like the Batesville plastic urn vaults. You can notice on the end of the vault lid there is an inset where a screw could be placed. This was also confirmed by the funeral director who sent the picture. He did not think that the lid had a butyl tape seal also, but this could not be confirmed.

He was told that the price of the unit would be $750 plus $150 for the graveside set up.

If more information becomes available I will make sure to share.

What are your thoughts?