Nancy Bush faced an enormous challenge: planning her husband’s funeral without knowing exactly what he wanted. While suffering from terminal cancer, John Bush couldn’t bring himself to talk about his dying wishes. Nancy Bush had to make some educated guesses, while grieving and under stress.
She didn’t want others to go through the same ordeal, so she teamed with longtime friend, Sue Kruskopf, to create MyWonderfulLife.com, a free, secure Web site where members plan and personalize their own funerals. They also can write letters to loved ones, design their headstones, make arrangements for pets, and designate up to six “angels” who receive access to their final wishes after their deaths.
“We’d been to one too many funerals that were so generic they could have been for anyone,” says Kruskopf, who is also CEO of Minneapolis advertising agency Kruskopf Coontz. “We found out that 71 percent of baby boomers don’t want a traditional funeral. This generation is going to change death just like they have everything else.”
Kruskopf and Bush view MyWonderfulLife.com as a way to reshape the funeral industry to meet the needs of aging baby boomers. Launched in May, the site has more than 3,000 members and 8 to 10 percent of visitors sign up for its services.
