Columbaria Pricing

Martin Eberly asks:

St. Joseph Cemetery Association is a stand alone cemetery. By that I mean we do not receive any subsidies from the parishes in town. Our fee structure is in line with the other major cemetery in town. My question concerns the columbaria. We currently charge $1,500 per a single niche and $300 for the plaque. For a companion niche, (2 niches), we charge $3,500 and $400 for the single niche. It has taken seven years and the original two columbaria still are not full but were to the point where we felt we needed to install three more to give people a choice of where in these columbaria they wish to be interred. Our current price for a single grave is $800. We have checked with other Catholic cemeteries concerning pricing and they seem to be less in cost.

We need to pay for the columbaria going forward but we need to price these so they are not so much more expensive than our graves, where we allow two cremation interments per grave. How does your cemetery price these niches to make them an attractive option?

Thank you,

Martin Eberly
St. Joseph Cemetery Association
Fremont, OH
martineberly@sbcglobal.net