Daniel: I looked at LWN a few years back, at the request of a reader who was holding onto the stock. I don't recall too many of the specifics, but I do recall that, unfortunately as it turns out, I was unable to convince him to sell LWN.
My hazy recollection is that the principal owner had mismanaged the firm for a number of years, and had failed to deliver on a series of reforms that had repeatedly been promised to analysts and outside shareholders. For all I know, he may be gone. But, I would't go near LWN unless he is already out of the picture.
On a more fundamental note, there are questions about whether the funeral industry affords significant economies of scale -- enough to warrant getting into a lot of debt to buy up the small operators. Outside of using market power to get the casket makers to lower their prices, where are the cost savings from consolidation? Every funeral is still a one-at-a-time, labor intensive, local affair. People aren't going to drive great distances to go to a super multiplex funeral parlor. Would national advertising be more cost effective than local radio spots and newspaper ads? Can they get labor costs below those of what was typically a family business to begin with? I don't really know the answers, but so far LWN has not been the Blockbuster Mortuary it was supposed to be.
porc --''''>
web.idirect.com/~telcomm |
