Dignity Share Discussion Threads

[velocytongo] 06/9/2022 13:39

I watched your conspiracy man on Fox, sorry GB News. Very little kills people in that age group and so even doubling is off a very small number, indeed.

[velocytongo] 06/9/2022 13:34

scarboro, there are plenty of cyclists with heart issues (the three people I mentioned above are all cyclists).

[velocytongo] 06/9/2022 13:11

Interesting that the conspiracy theorist reaches for the vaccine as the likely explanation when it is more probable that C19 and its longer-term effects are behind the rise in mortality. I've three mates, all under 50, in excellent health, and with no family history of heart disease who have had heart problems. Their doctors all now believe that there is a link with C19 as the episodes took place before the vaccine rollout.

The death rate in the last reported weeks was 6% and 9% above the corresponding weeks in 2021.

Total deaths YTD in Eng/Wales 374,970 2022 vs 385,363 in 2021.

My cousin was cremated last week and there were only two slots available at the crematorium in Kent in the month ahead. Summer is normally a slow time of year for the funeral business.

[insideryou] 06/9/2022 08:08

The video with Dr Campbell references the gov data continually.

[scarboro] 05/9/2022 18:47

thank you - I thought you may have had a link to a .gov website - they admit largest cause of death in 2021 was heart related but likely that is nothing new...excess death consistently above the average

[insideryou] 05/9/2022 16:51

Https://youtu.be/gkQ7LsHPASA just one of them. Dr John Campbell on YouTube with 3m follower's also did an in depth look at excessive deaths cause unknown...

[scarboro] 05/9/2022 10:31

do you have a link for that please insideryou?

[velocytongo] 31/8/2022 14:03

I think crem market share will be different as most undertakers do not own a crem and will use a third party like coop, dty or the council.

[tgoldie] 25/8/2022 11:22

All things equal though, one would assume with a 10-15% national market share of funerals directed, then with a national crematoria footprint this would be mirrored so 10-15% of Dignity cremations would be from Dignity arranged funerals?

[velocytongo] 25/8/2022 11:13

All good for DTY with their 40+ crems.

[tgoldie] 25/8/2022 09:00

Yes, there must be some considerable benefit but they’d likely have to double investment in storage (space and £££) to accommodate doubled/trebled volumes along with additional staff.

Weekend funerals are already a thing, crematoria offer them usually for 150-200% of the cost, and it’ll be the crematoria that dictate weekend funerals as they are their availability rather than a funeral director’s willingness to work on a weekend surely?

[velocytongo] 22/8/2022 15:22

I think the head office function is high and the staff costs are fixed. As regards the latter, if parlors can conduct more funerals without employing extra staff, then there is operating leverage there. Certainly, the staff at my local funeral parlors do not appear to be working that hard.

I think they are also looking to do weekend funerals, which to me is a no-brainer. Why not celebrate someone's life without taking a day off?

[tgoldie] 22/8/2022 09:12

Granted, but even assuming 100% operational leverage (I.e. no additional labour, petrol, utilities, coffin(!)) you’re talking an extra c.35,000 full service funerals (and 80,000 total additional to achieve that mix) to get that £30m back in revenue - realistic?

Also, I assume more staff would be required to deliver these as it’s largely a fixed cost operation so that will hit costs at every step where additional resources need to be brought in.

Am I missing any operational efficiencies you were considering VelocyTongo, as accepted I’m just an amateur observer!?

[velocytongo] 21/8/2022 17:33

tgoldie, it looks like your numbers do not assume any operating leverage

[tgoldie] 19/8/2022 17:09

You’re 100% right, needs a seismic marker share since the price drop to just get back on terms with prior profit levels.

In 2020 average revenue from full service funerals was £3,332 which was c.34,500 funerals. Fast forward to last quarter 2021 which is the first to include the new price card and that average was £2,465 (remember those 2020 averages would have been hit by reduced full service due to COVID). So a £867 drop in average across say 35,000 full service funerals is a c.£30m hit to margin. Taking the ‘generous̵7; £500 contribution per funeral, Dignity would have to undertake an additional 60,000 full service funerals just to get back to where they were. Assuming the 43% of funerals are full service, in total they would need to grab an additional 140,000 funerals a year - so 220,000 in total (forgive the round numbers for ease) which is over a third of the whole market, I’d question how achievable this is. Accept cost cutting measures have been taken but the costs must largely be in the property portfolio, vehicle and staffing that are needed to deliver funerals.

Against a backdrop of spiralling inflation, I’d hope management are reconsidering the price reduction as cash reserves surely won’t last, and this stock will continue to bumble along acutely under value

[tombomb] 17/8/2022 10:50

WE are still talking negligible impact on DTY's performance. OK - let's say there are 5,000 excess/additional deaths. Dignity have a 12% market share and may pick up 600 additional funerals. Let's be very generous and give them a £500 net profit on each of those additional funerals and they will make a grand total of £300,000 additional profit.

Death rate and volume is not going to save Dignity. Winning greater market share and cutting costs is the only way they are going to get out of the debt situation

[velocytongo] 17/8/2022 09:47

Thanks for that TB, which is why I also mention the YoY death rate, and which is critical for DTY as they work their way thru the price reset. During Q1 YoY deaths were down substantially for the first few months and would have been the reason they sought a covenant waiver. Since then death no of deaths has been

I'm wondering if the YoY death rate stays where it is, they can trade their way out of the debt situation.

[tombomb] 16/8/2022 22:47

You're still going massively off track trying to judge performance by how many deaths there are this year compared to the 5 year average. The death rate is forecast to be going up year on year based purely on the population bubble working it's way through. There is forecast to be just over 603k deaths this year, up to 607k next year, 613k in 2024 right up to 790k by 2050.

The 5 year average is good for looking at seasonality trends and proportion of deaths throughout the year, but a bit of a sh*t measure for what you are trying to get from it.

[velocytongo] 16/8/2022 15:44

ONS data today + 1,350/14% above the 5 year av. Total deaths YTD 342,691 vs 354,708 in 2021. At the current rate, deaths will have caught up with 2021 rate in two months with around 600,00 for the year, just 14,000k lower than 2020, which was peak pandemic.