This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Let's talk about something important here today, life and death, which is, well, let's say dying is part of life for approximately 100% of us. It's not something we always like to think about, but when we realize, hey, we're all in this same club, you know, eventually, one way or another, maybe it gives you some perspective. In the past, we've had a feature on two German friends. This was episode 214 long, long ago. Two German friends who set out to reinvent the funeral urn business with colorful designs.
It's actually a beautiful project because they talked about how prior to their business, every funeral urn in Germany looked, you know, pretty basic and boring. They thought, well, at the end of their lives, people might want to express themselves differently, you know, with some kind of artistic expression or something different. So anyway, interesting story there, episode 214. And to bring us up to modern times here, one of the consequences of the pandemic era is that families and loved ones have not always been able to grieve together at funerals or memorial services when someone dies. And if you think about, okay, what is the purpose of a funeral or a wake or anything like that, it is to offer a space for grief.
So we had another story once, episode 721, about an Australian guy who starts an online memorial service. And he actually started this more than two years ago. So pre-COVID, at the time, I believe he was thinking largely of people who weren't able to travel to a service. Maybe they were overseas or otherwise far away or just couldn't get away to attend a service. And so this was a way to bring them together, you know, wherever they were.
But of course, this idea might be all the more relevant today. So that's what one of our listeners is wondering about. He's wondering about developing an online memorial service of his own. So let's hear from him. Well, first, a quick message from our sponsor, and then we'll talk about this idea of an online memorial service.
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Hey, Chris, this is Brad from Denver. And I've been listening to your show since episode one. I can't believe we're on season five. I heard an old episode you did about someone who provided online memorials. I imagine that's something that is of special significance during a pandemic, when people aren't able to travel to services or in some cases, even gather in one town.
I'd like to offer a version of this, complete with a range of options, including a message from a local minister or a Toastmasters club speaker, a webpage where people can leave messages and maybe even some offline followup materials that go out in the mail. My thought is that in the future, more and more memorial services will be online. Even when it's safe to attend them in person, or in some cases, there will be an online version and an in-person service. Do you have any advice? [Music]
Brad, thank you so much for listening all the way since episode one.
I can't believe we're on season five either. And as for your idea, I mean, I thought a lot about this because it is absolutely a need, okay? It's absolutely something that needs to be done better. I think the whole industry of death care has had to evolve quite a bit in the past year. And some of these changes are accelerated because of the pandemic.
But I think the reality is that industry should have had better online services before, right? Because there are people, you know, like I mentioned in that other episode about how like there are people who just aren't always able to travel for whatever reason or attend a loved one's service. That said, there are two parts to this process. This whole process of, you know, what is my idea? How am I going to develop my idea?
How am I gonna profit from it? How am I gonna grow it, et cetera? You know, the first part is, is there a need? There's absolutely a need for sure. But the second part of the process is asking if you are the best person to meet this need.
Okay, so that's what's missing here, at least from the information we have so far. Like there's a lot of complexity to an idea like this. And it has to be handled with care. It has to be done right. There's a lot of tech elements to it.
There's a whole question of marketing. How do people hear about it in the first place? And of course you have to do it with empathy. So it has to be really well done and it requires a broad skill set to do it. So to me, it doesn't seem like a hundred dollar project in the sense of like, oh, this is quick and dirty.
I can just start this up and, you know, see how it goes. If I had this idea myself, like if I had thought of it instead of Brad, you know, which I didn't, I'm not selling his idea. I might be qualified enough to say, yes, that's definitely, you know, an idea with real potential, but I'm pretty sure I would also know right away, it's not a good idea for me because I don't have that skill set. You know, I don't have the patience among other things, but also the technical skill set and just the vision to kind of see it through. And so that's my question to Brad.
Do you have the skills you need to see this through? I can't answer that for him. So if the answer is yes, and he's like, this is absolutely what I wanna do, then great, you know, far be it from me to hold you up or hold you back at all. But if not, if you're like, actually there is a lot of complexity there that I haven't thought about, then if not, it might be good to consider some ideas that are simpler. And as you develop the skill of spotting possibilities, which is a big part of what we're trying to do here with Sidussle School, show people that they already have the ability to spot different opportunities, well, then you also need to develop your ability to filter them.
So that's what I'm gonna end with today. Listeners, if you have a question, come to sidehustleschool.com/questions. We'll continue to feature them throughout the year, along with updates from other listeners as they launch their projects. Thank you so much for joining me. I hope you'll come back tomorrow.
My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is "Sidussle School." [Music]
From the Onward Project.
