Painkillers, Safari Rides, and Free Websites: A Conversation With Tukios’ Founder, Curtis Funk
If you’ve been a member of the deathcare profession for any length of time, you’ve probably heard of Tukios. It’s one of those company names that you immediately recognize; after all, it’s most likely the only deathcare company with a Swahili moniker and a lime-green logo in a beach-themed convention booth. But do you really know what Tukios is all about? And, more importantly, why Tukios is truly the best partner for your business? We asked all these questions — and more — of Curtis Funk, Tukios founder and all-around super-cool guy.
Connecting Directors: Curtis, thanks so much for your time. Do you mind if we start at the beginning? Specifically, how did you get started in deathcare?
Curtis Funk: I’ve actually been in the funeral industry for over 20 years … since I was a teenager.
CD: Oh? So you grew up in a funeral home?
CF: No, that’s what’s so crazy; my family had no connection to it all. But I went to my first funeral when I was 15; it was for my great-grandma. The funeral home recorded the memorial service on an audio cassette tape. This was in 1999, when everything was already on CDs. I mean, who had a cassette player lying around? That sparked my initial interest in the funeral service.
CD: You probably thought something like, “There has to be a better way,” right?
CF: Honestly, that was my older brother’s idea. He’s a musician who owns a recording studio. He had the equipment to convert the cassette tape to a CD. That’s when I realized we could digitally record services for funeral homes and put them on CDs.
CD: Wait, you had this idea when you were just a high school student?
CF: Yeah. So, my brother did sales at first, but after that I would skip class to visit funeral homes. I’d attend a funeral and record it, then we’d take the recording and cut it into different tracks and put them on CD. It was a great side hustle.
CD: But it wasn’t just a side hustle for long, right?
CF: Right. We built some software to simplify the process and thought, “Maybe we can turn this into a business.” So we built a website and called it FuneralRecording.com; then we’d put the recordings on the internet. That’s how, back in 2007, we became one of the first companies to livestream funerals.
CD: Wow! If that doesn’t prove you’re an industry innovator, nothing will. So what happened next?
CF: That year, 2007, was pivotal for the company. I bought my brother out of the business, quit my other jobs, and went full-time with Funeral Recording, doing the audio recording and providing recording equipment to about 200 or so funeral homes. The same month, I got married and bought a house.
CD: Yeah, that really was a big year! But you’re Tukios now, and you no longer offer livestreaming or recording services. When did that shift happen?
CF: Over those first few years, I started to realize that what we were selling was a vitamin, not a painkiller. Livestreaming didn’t really become a pain — a problem that had to be solved — until Covid. Not everyone needed livestreaming services, so I knew we needed to build another product that every funeral home really needs in order to solve a pain.
CD: What was that product?
CF: Well, we did build a few websites back in 2009 and 2010, but where we really saw a need was in tribute video software. There were plenty of providers, but everyone was doing it their own way; the industry was pretty fragmented, but every provider had their own sort of competitive advantage. I looked at all of them and thought, if I take the best of everything, that’s actually going to solve the pain. We built the first web-based tribute video software that didn’t require photo scanning or DVD burning. We really started to build a brand.
CD: And that brand was Tukios?
CF: I realized that if we were going to build video creation software that could be used for anything, and not just funerals, Funeral Recording wasn’t the best name. At the same time, I realized how generic our brand looked — I’ve attended the NFDA convention since 2007, but at the time, we didn’t stand out at all. I didn’t want to be that anymore. That’s when we decided we would wear lime green shirts and our booth would look like a bar on the beach. And we’d have a name no one had ever heard of.
CD: So how did you settle on Tukios?
CF: I was stuck on a safari ride at Disney World, and the driver of the bus pointed out a baobab tree. He said “baobab” means “upside down” in Swahili, because the tree looks like the roots are coming out of the top. So I set out to find a Swahili word for what we did — building videos around life events. That’s when I found out that “tukios” is the Swahili word for events. And our brand was born. I bought the Tukios domain from my iPhone as I sat on that bus that day.
CD: What a cool story! So how did Tukios get from there to where you are now?
CF: Over the years, we became the number one player in tribute video software. Then, we became the fastest-growing website provider. At our core, though, it really boils down to that concept of selling painkillers versus vitamins. We’re here to solve problems for funeral homes and get rid of the pain — and we want to do that with minimal cost, if there is any cost at all to the families and funeral directors.
CD: But we all know nothing in this world is free — especially not customized websites that look like the ones the folks at Tukios create … Right?
CF: Not true. Our websites ARE free. We don’t have to add air quotes or an asterisk to the word free. The product has become more than just managing obits. It’s more of a platform now.
CD: The Tukios platform? So it’s not just a website?
CF: Tukios is a technology platform full of tools that were built with the purpose of growing a funeral home’s business. It includes software for arranging funerals online, managing events, creating tribute videos, and a lot more. We’ve even built and integrated an entire floral ordering system.
CD: How does that work?
CF: The floral software is basically an order management system that allows funeral homes to partner with their preferred local florist. It includes e-commerce sales, flower fulfillment, and order management. The florist is in control, which keeps them happy, which keeps the funeral home happy. Flowers arrive on time and families don’t have to pay as much as they might elsewhere, so the families pay less, and the funeral home makes more.
CD: That’s genius. So Tukios does pretty much everything a funeral home needs?
CF: Well, there are areas we’ve stayed away from on purpose, like case management and accounting. And we parted ways with our livestreaming services years ago. But we partner with the best of the best in these and other areas, like Passari, Halcyon, Osiris, OneRoom, TribuCast, and many others. We work very closely with them so that our software integrates with these systems seamlessly. Our funeral homes that use Tukios and these other products really feel like they’re working with an all-in-one system.
CD: So, wait. You offer all these things, in one platform, for … FREE?
CF: Aside from our original video platform, yes! Everything is included. We’re not upselling or nickel and diming on anything. Our mission is “to equip funeral directors with innovative tools to create meaningful experiences for every grieving family.” The tools in the Tukios platform are built to generate revenue for the funeral home, and we partner with each funeral home for a small percentage of that revenue. The better our platform works to raise awareness and drive traffic to the funeral home, the more meaningful experiences they can create, and the more revenue is generated for everyone.
CD: Speaking of driving traffic, I’ll bet you gather a ton of information from the websites you manage.
CF: We do, and any data we gather will always belong to the funeral home — 100%. Guestbook entries, subscriptions to receive obituaries, or sign-ups for grief programs … all of that first-party audience data stays with the funeral home in the Tukios platform.
CD: Do you gather analytics data to share with the funeral homes?
CF: We do quarterly coaching sessions with every customer, and during that session we’ll give them a breakdown of their traffic data so they can understand what people are coming to their website to find. We break those visitors down even further into three buckets: Mourners, who are coming to the website to find an obituary; shoppers, who are coming to look at products, packages, and pricing; and planners who are visiting preneed pages and looking at pricing widgets. We also show them how their e-commerce is performing and any conclusions we’ve drawn from the analytics that can help them grow their business. For example, we’ve found that if you write longer obituaries, you sell more flowers; it’s the weirdest correlation, but we’ve found that it’s true across thousands of websites and hundreds of millions of visitors.
CD: That is weird, but also fascinating! And it’s truly actionable information. What other guidance does Tukios provide?
CF: It all comes down to equipping the funeral home with the tools and widgets that can grow their business, and that means keeping our platform relevant for users. We study macro trends to be sure buyers are getting what they need. We know that buyers are getting younger, and they’re an internet generation that buys online. So, we make sure that when a consumer is looking and shopping online, they can easily find pricing or can build a package and know exactly what’s available before they step foot in the funeral home. Our goal is to make the funeral home the center of the universe; when someone goes online and says, “I need to plan a funeral,” we want to put the local funeral home in front of them and make sure they have what they’re looking for.
CD: So buyers are younger and more internet-savvy, but not all funeral home personnel have the same level of expertise when it comes to online platforms. How do you overcome this potential barrier?
CF: You know, when we first built the video software, we’d say, “It’s so easy your grandma could use it.” And you know, we meant that. My grandma was still alive at the time, so I’d go over to her house and we’d sit down at the computer and she’d click around and figure it out. These days when we ask funeral directors for their feedback, the two things that come up the most are the simplicity or ease of use and our service.
CD: Tell us about that service!
CF: We answer the phone on the first ring, and we’re real people in the United States in the Tukios offices. We are very serious about servicing our funeral homes. When a funeral director needs help, we’re as available as we can possibly be. We have a lot of young college students on our team because they’re tech natives — they were born into this technology. When they get on the phone with a funeral home they’re like, “Let me do that for you right now,” and they take care of the issue right then.
CD: Speaking of young folks and technology today … Does artificial intelligence play a role at Tukios?
CF: We have a handful of AI tools we built to write obituaries, moderate guest book entries, and just do some of the daily tasks for the funeral home, but in all honesty, AI is built into everything. The next few things you’ll see us release with AI will be integrated into the daily operations.
CD: Very cool. But what do you mean by “moderate guest book entries?”
CF: On average, a funeral home admin might have to read 250 to 300 online guest book entries every few weeks to toss out one entry that’s questionable. That’s a lot of work and a lot of hours for one item. With our AI guest book moderator, that review is done for them; the tool decides what needs to be tossed out and emails the admin with the results. That’s just a huge time savings, and it’s just one of the ways we integrate AI into daily activities.
CD: Like magic… but it’s Tukios!
CF: Technology is advancing really quickly right now, and we’re taking those advancements in technology and bringing them into the software the funeral home is using everyday. They no longer have to use this application for this and that application for that. You just do what you’re doing everyday. And we’re going to bring those efficiencies to you.
CD: And, just to confirm, because it seems almost too good to be true, this is all FREE?
CF: The website is free, and there is no charge with most of our products. There are no fees for the funeral home for building or hosting a website. We’ll never invoice them. There’s no monthly subscription for using our video software, and there’s no contract. They pay to use it when they make a video; if they don’t make videos, they don’t pay. We’ll never lock anyone into a contract or have any time requirement at all. Our thought is that we feel like we need to earn their business everyday. We need to prove that we’re providing so much value that they can’t live without us. But if someone wants to leave, we want to be the easiest company to quit.
CD: Is it equally as easy to switch to Tukios?
CF: We do what’s in the best interest of the funeral home; they’re completely in control of the process, but we do all the work. We build their website, show it to them, get their feedback, make any requested revisions, then push the site live once they give us the green light — they don’t have to lift a finger. We’ll transfer all of their existing data, too — obituaries, guestbook entries, etc. — and we integrate all their existing software. It’s really seamless. We’ve even found a way to make sure the old version of the website doesn’t show up online during the transition.
CD: Sounds like you’re living up to your mission.
CF: We’ve all internalized our mission, purpose, and core values. We’re dedicated to strengthening the funeral industry one service at a time, and keep funeral homes relevant in a world where technology and buyers are changing. Funeral directors are awesome people, and they’re doing a job I could never do. We’ve really just found a lot of satisfaction in trying to make that really difficult job a little easier.
To learn more about Tukios and schedule a free demo, visit Tukios.com today!
