Philip White, fifth-generation owner of White Emerson Mortuary, alongside his son Paul White, sixth-generation funeral director and managing director, have tried different funeral home software over the years.

They began using Passare one year ago and have been extremely pleased with the ease of the implementation, the attentiveness of the support team, and improved internal communication.

Passare has checked all the boxes for them.

How long have you been with Passare?

Phil: We’ve been with Passare for about a year.

We have two locations. Our flagship location is in Whittier, CA, and we have an economy brand that we bought last year.

We decided that as we were getting our feet wet with Passare, we wanted to implement it right off the bat. We thought it would be a smoother process to learn the new software altogether instead of switching later on down the line.

How would you describe transitioning to Passare?

Phil: I will be very honest and preface everything I’m saying by emphasizing that I’ve been in the funeral business for 43 years.

I’m the fifth generation of my family to own and operate White Emerson in over 130 years. I’ve always loved technology. That passion translated into me constantly bringing new technologies into the business. I have tried virtually every software out there.

So, to answer your question, the implementation of Passare has been the most seamless software experience thus far.

Passare has really shined in two significant ways during the transition process:

1. The software is great and it does exactly what you advertise that it does.

2. Your staff provided the very best service I could have ever dreamed of during implementation. Hands down. No comparison.

Thank you for sharing some of the backstory. It's always interesting to hear where a funeral home started compared to where it is now. Since you have a lot of experience with software, what challenge prompted you to switch to Passare?

Phil: Leading up to Passare, we used a mix of QuickBooks, Google Calendar, and Google Sheets. We used all of these different platforms for our contracts and scheduling services. We made it work, but it wasn’t an ideal situation for any of our employees. We were trying to coordinate and manage too many platforms.

Now, with Passare, we are all finding value in the integration of having one platform to do everything. It has helped with efficiency.

Awesome! What specific challenge has it helped you address? 

Phil: The biggest thing is intercompany communication. The communication lines between our whole team, as it relates to the families, have seen significant improvements. Anytime there have been changes from families regarding their preferences surrounding the service, our whole staff can be notified and updated. It has been tremendously helpful.

So, the streamlined platform has helped us with any challenges we previously faced with communicating within our team.

Since implementing Passare, is there a specific situation where Passare helped you complete a task quickly?

Phil: We have seen improvements and sped up processes tied to our financial piece and contracts. Passare streamlines the whole process, so it has reduced errors in the creation of family service contracts and that’s very helpful.

Plus, the inner company communications have definitely been the most helpful thus far. Anytime there have been any changes from the families regarding their services or desires or wishes, everyone knows about it because funeral directors can tag each other in notes, which is brilliant.

Has there been anything that has stood out to you about Passare?

Paul: The support team has been very attentive. The software is great, and the systems are great. The team has been a very encouraging part of this process.

Phil: Oh, absolutely. Your team has been absolute rock stars. I’ve been around for a long time, and it can be difficult to teach old dogs new tricks. I went into this very skeptical because I have been here so many times before with the painstaking task of integrating a new system.

Hands down, the support we received was the best I have ever seen. Above the product and the software, it is your people. Your people are miles above the product.

Would you recommend Passare to a colleague? If so, why? 

Paul: We have already recommended Passare to two different colleagues!

Phil: We recommend Passare because it has checked more boxes than any other software I’ve ever implemented, and the people are first-class.

About the funeral home:

Philip White, owner, and son Paul White, funeral director and managing director, of White Emerson Mortuary. Each year they serve around 850 families at their 2 different locations in California. Their main location is in Whittier, California.

Want a success story like Philip and Paul's? It all starts with a demo.