“It’s all about high-powered selling. The average member of the public only gets an inkling that the funeral home is American-owned when the final bill is sent out. The Americans are just like a lot of parasites eating away at the country.” He emphasized that “the main message to get through to everyone is, one, ask if the funeral director is independent, and, two, get an estimate from at least two different funeral directors.”

Green Undertakings, where Mr. A is now working, is far more to his liking. “We don’t offer packages. We ask a client what part of the funeral arrangements they want us to do,” he said. “There is no need to say good-bye by spending a lot of money. We encourage families to provide their own bearers. As to embalming, I haven’t embalmed a single body at Green Undertakings, though I would if asked.”

Mr. B, as I will call him, had been employed for four years by a Plantsbrook funeral parlor; several months after SCI took over, he resigned. “I was very unhappy with them,” he said. “I left because I couldn’t stand it. SCI just chases the buck; their commercialism is going to ruin them in the end.”

SCI has its own canny method of gradually softening up the new British employees, a form of behavior modification designed to ease them into acceptance of the American Way. For the first six months or so, Mr. B said, nothing really changed. Then, all employees were summoned to a meeting in a smart Kensington hotel where a new range of coffins was unveiled, amid assurance by the SCI mentors that they were not going to promote high-pressure sales techniques. “The old Plantsbrook range was made up of typically English-looking, pleasant coffins,” said Mr. B. But the new lot was proof to him that despite their protestations, “the Americans are committed to a very subtle form of high pressure.”

Here is how it works: The cheapest available is not displayed in the showroom, and there are no photos of it in the brochure. The only time it is ever mentioned is if somebody telephones to inquire about prices, the assumption being that “if they are the type of customer who is phoning, they will phone everybody to compare prices.” Total price of the rock-bottom funeral is $1,016 [24](which does not include “disbursements,” embalming, or complimentary car).

Those who come into the funeral parlor looking for a bargain will not be told of this option—“We were not allowed to mention it face-to-face with somebody in the shop,” said Mr. B. Instead, they are told the cheapest is “The Fundamental,” which Mr. B says looks like cardboard—and moreover, “it is specifically designed to look like cardboard.” The price of a funeral using “The Fundamental:” over $1,760—not including disbursements. $1,340 of this sum is for “professional services,” a hearse, and limo.

There are two more in the bottom range: “The Primary,” which “looks like a hi-fi unit that someone has dismantled and then put together to look like a coffin,” and “The White Pearl.” “They really look cheap,” said Mr. B. “It’s really bloody painfully obvious. The first three in the range are so awful. I wouldn’t bury or cremate your dog in the first two, let alone a member of your family. The cardboard ones really look super-cheap.” The fourth coffin is “The Consort,” which is “the nearest to the traditional English coffin,” but costs $760! To which, of course is added the $1,340 fee for “professional services” and the rest of the paraphernalia.

“Every single funeral director in every single shop complained about the coffins,” said Mr. B.

The above prices are in any event only meant for the serious bargain hunter, the rare hard-nosed individual whose main concern is keeping down the cost. For the average customer, “funeral directors are instructed to work from the top of the range down, and to keep the family in the coffin showroom for forty minutes. We are pushed to sell the more expensive coffins.” And here come the carrots and sticks: at the beginning of each year, each funeral parlor is assigned a target figure and a target budget. This is further refined as a breakdown of the number of funerals each is expected to perform each month and how much should be earned per funeral. “Some funeral directors have to sell a Consort or above to reach the budget figure,” Mr. B explained. Those who fail to achieve the budget figure get a letter or phone call expressing disappointment; Somebody Up There is watching, namely SCI’s control department. Mr. B had such a phone call last January, saying that he was down 12 pounds from the sales of the previous January. Conversely, two thousand overachievers are singled out each year for a “loyalty or productivity” bonus.

The SCI bigwigs were inclined to shrug off adverse comments from any quarter. Eric Spencer, an Englishman whose SCI title is senior director of corporate development, was chief executive of the Great Southern Group before the takeover. His primary responsibility, he said, is in Europe, although he does also look after some of the British acquisitions.

“This anti-American hysteria is quite laughable,” he said. “Although SCI is owned by Americans, there are only two American executives permanently in the U.K. Everyone below them is English.” He explained that SCI intended to maintain a low profile; it refused to get into a shouting match with its detractors in the media, which is why they declined the invitation to appear in the “Public Eye” documentary. He now thinks that decision might have been a mistake, and said that “we’ll see a more active response from SCI in the future.”

Peter Hindley, the English chief executive of SCI in the U.K., is the author of many an in-house directive to “All Staff.” Accusations of hard sell? “Absolute rubbish,” he said. “We do not have hard-sell tactics. What we have is people offering client choices, informed choice. We offer a much wider range of coffins than other funeral directors. We will offer a much greater range of ashes caskets [cremation urns]. We will offer memorial books, and a much wider range of graveside memorials. We will offer a better range of flowers.” Echoing his memo to “All Staff” in the wake of the “Public Eye” documentary (in his opinion, the program was “motivated by some of our competitors”), he declared that “small-minded funeral businesses spend their life trying to sling mud at SCI.”

Of far greater moment than the slings and arrows of the media to SCI’s plans for achieving its goal of “enhancing its revenues by enhancing consumer choices” is the May 1995 report of the Monopolies and Mergers Commission presented to Parliament by the secretary of trade and industry by command of Her Majesty. The MMC is the British counterpart of the Federal Trade Commission, but the approach of the two agencies to their mandated job of consumer protection couldn’t be more different.

The FTC does not normally concern itself with so-called market share until it becomes formidable enough to threaten competition in wide regional areas. SCI’s national market share in the U.S., measured in terms of its own undertaking establishments, is about 10 percent. Not to worry, says the FTC. But what of Houston, Texas, where SCI’s market share, measured by its share of the funeral business, is no less than 70 percent?

The MMC, recognizing that competition in the funeral trade is of local rather than national concern, has taken a different view of SCI’s recent acquisitions in the U.K. It has condemned the merger on the ground that “it may be expected to operate against the public interest.” Its reasons stated with typically British reserve, the report castigates the merger in terms which would equally apply to SCI’s operations in the U.S. and Australia: