Although a majority of Americans in surveys say that the idea of funeral pre-planning and pre-funding makes a lot of sense and is something they should do, fewer than 15% of people actually take the step to complete advance planning. 

Sales in the funeral insurance industry have remained relatively flat over the past 10 years, at about $4 billion annually. Over the next decade, Homesteaders Life Co. — a leader in funeral insurance and pre-planning — seeks to spur a significant increase in the level of pre-planning, with a goal of providing pre-arrangement and funding for 2 million new consumers by 2030. 

As part of its growth strategy, the West Des Moines-based insurer recently promoted Jill Muenich, formerly vice president of business development, as the president of a new sales subsidiary: Homesteaders Solutions Group. She began her career as a district sales leader with Frito-Lay/PepsiCo Foods, and has held sales roles with companies ranging from MassMutual Financial Group to Verizon, and before joining Homesteaders was vice president of marketing services for National Guardian Life Co. in Madison. 

Notably, when Homesteaders hired Muenich in March 2019, the Wisconsin native negotiated to work 50% of the time from her home in Madison and 50% from Homesteaders’ headquarters in West Des Moines. Since the pandemic, however, Muenich has largely worked remotely from her home in Wisconsin. She will be leveraging technology in her leadership role of integrating and managing a growing portfolio of resources that today includes eFuneral Solutions, Domani’s Preneed Planning Center and Domanicare. All but about 20 team members of the company have worked remotely from their homes during the pandemic. 

As a female leader in the insurance industry and an openly lesbian individual, Muenich credits Homesteaders for actively embracing diversity and inclusion. 

She had known Homesteaders’ president and CEO, Steve Shaffer, from having served with him and other senior leaders of Homesteaders in leadership and committee roles for the Funeral Service Foundation. 

“Homesteaders is a wonderful organization, and we’ll be celebrating being 115 years old this coming February,” Muenich said. “We don’t advertise our brand, so whenever I get a chance to, I ask people to consider pre-funding and pre-planning their funeral because it is a lasting gift — and maybe the last gift — that they give their families. When I say that, it is heartfelt, because it’s what motivates me to impact more consumers. That’s just one of the reasons I joined Homesteaders, just because my values are so aligned.”  

How does pre-need insurance work?  

As the insurance company we become the fiduciary responsible entity with the normal risk-based capital; we have to be able to pay every claim if everyone [covered] were to die at the same time. So it [increases] consumer confidence because in the old days people would give the money to the funeral home, and what if the funeral home went out of business, or what if there wasn’t a succession plan? We’re held to a very high standard by all the commissioners of insurance, particularly in Iowa where we’re domiciled. So we’re no different than any other insurance carrier — think of all your property and casualty carriers with the same risk and reward going on to benefit our policyholders.

How do you see the growth potential for the pre-need industry? 

From my perspective, the potential is great, and that’s what I’m most excited about. Our whole core focus is to connect our funeral home partners with more consumers. I feel that our industry should be sitting at about $12 billion [in annual revenues, compared with the current $4 billion]. The target market of baby boomers represents about 60 million Americans. 

What’s the vision for your new role? 

I’m a part of the sales team, but it’s always been Steve Shaffer’s vision to have solutions that connect us with more consumers than ever before. No one in our industry is actually doing that — they approach the sale with, “Connect with more funeral homes and kind of do your best, and send out a lot of good marketing.” We’re going to try to be influencers and drive consumers back towards our funeral partners, not disintermediating anyone. We’re not going direct-to-consumer, but we are wanting to be better influencers through those three prongs of best-in-class solutions. It’s more strategic distribution — having more influence with those folks that we already have in our family of funeral homes and marketing partners and giving them stronger tools and access. … Homesteaders writes a half-billion dollars [in face value of pre-need insurance] a year. We are a leader and the most preferred pre-need company in America — that comes with some humility and responsibility. 

Did Homesteaders want you to move to Des Moines when you joined the company, or for your new role? 

That never really came up. Talent travels, right? And it opens up your talent pool. Especially with COVID now, we’ve learned a lot. Maybe all of us living in the same community isn’t as relevant anymore. As I’m now taking on the role as president, none of my team currently lives in Des Moines [other than headquarters staff who provide shared services]. My current financial and strategic teammate lives in Salt Lake City. Some of our current [candidates] don’t live in Des Moines either, and some of them are current internal Homesteaders candidates. So it shines a light on it. … COVID has accelerated the learning that people can be incredibly productive, and through Zoom you can still have very strong interpersonal relationships. 

How has the pandemic affected how Homesteaders reaches its target market? 

Through COVID, our target market is being influenced by technology. In COVID, we couldn’t go out and see a family. For our target market, our average age of issuance is a 74-year-old. … It would have been a little more difficult to engage with them using Zoom. But now because of COVID, they’re wanting to engage with their children and grandchildren, so our target market is much more receptive to a remote sales opportunity. At the same time, COVID has been a horrific problem for our industry because we work in pre-planning, but obviously we are tied to funeral professionals, and their [immediate] at-need services are very much increasing, and that’s a problem. Business has been down — it’s back to normal now, but we took a pretty deep dip, like every insurance company did, because we weren’t allowed to go out in public [to sell policies as stay at home orders were issued by governors in various states]. 

Has there been much movement toward working more closely with financial planners or life insurance companies to provide this product as part of a comprehensive package? 

When you do study groups and ask consumers where they expect to buy that product, they do mention the workplace, or from a financial planner, or maybe at a bank. So there is definitely exploration in that. And there are some of our competitors that actually have a product in that realm and are working in those distribution markets, if you will. I can’t say yes or no, because that hasn’t been decided. I think that Dean Lambert [Homesteaders’ senior vice president of marketing and communications] says it best: If you’re going to try to be something much larger, you can’t do the same things — you’ve got to do things differently. 

Could pre-need solutions be a viable employee benefit? 

It hasn’t taken a foothold yet, but maybe we haven’t figured out the distribution model to work with yet. But those are the kinds of things I’m being asked to take a look at to say, “How do we penetrate that? Let’s meet the consumer where they’re at.” … Overwhelmingly, study groups show that consumers expect to buy [pre-need plans] at the funeral homes, but they’re not going there at the rate they should be, so where else is next? Usually it’s the workplace, because that’s where you buy all your benefits today. It does make great sense; we just probably haven’t found that correct journey into the right partnership. 

Are there any new products on the horizon to be added that you’re excited about? 

It’s too early to tell. We’re in the exploration phase. If I was a betting woman, I would say it’s likely. … But the low interest rates still make it very difficult to pay strong commissions. You’re not maybe seeing the growth to cover the cost of inflation, so that’s something we’re always very concerned about because we want to be returning the best value for our policyholders. That’s why I smiled big when we started to talk about this, because what’s next for us and what needs to be explored really needs to be thought through. 

What are your strongest leadership traits? 

I am highly strategic, and I am an influencer. Those have served me well as a woman and as a leader in the industry because I set plans into motion by “bringing people with me.” I take great pride in building teams and getting people where they want to go, even if it means [they] leave the organization or the team. I think that human capital is a really important piece to focus on, because if you take care of your people, they will take care of your business. That is something that I’ve always hung my hat on. 

How challenging is it for a woman leader in your industry? 

I think overall, women have lacked access [to leadership roles], but I think that is changing. I know it’s obviously changed for myself. I think the change comes because there are dedicated companies very similar to Homesteaders that invoke the mentorship and sponsorship programs. And it’s got to be cross-gender; it can’t be that I just mentor our emerging women leaders, but I also mentor some of the emerging men and vice versa. … And there’s always a little bit of luck involved. I’ve really had great sponsors and really great mentors, and I feel I’ve been very lucky. 

This year there has been a tremendous emphasis on diversity and inclusion for people of color and for the LGBTQ community. How does that translate to this industry? 

The first part of solving that [issue] is to recognize it — I’m very proud of the diversity and inclusion work that Homesteaders is doing and has been doing. Insurance companies have put a lot more focus on being bilingual and providing materials and services in the needed language. And for the LGBT community … you just have to find a way to work together. Personally, I’ve always tried to be an advocate, to be a resource, to allow people to ask the difficult questions. Because we won’t learn as a society if people like me aren’t allowed to be great, and to have my voice, and to not let it shake when I introduce my wife. And carry on that momentum in all that I do. I came out when I was 14, but I’ve always decided to live my authentic self, no matter how difficult, which was telling my parents first. That wasn’t well received originally. Now it’s wonderfully received. … I hope that because of that I laid a little runway for those who will come after me to be inspired and to know they can do it as well. 

What charitable or civic organizations are you active in? 

I continue to be an influencer and a mentor, and [have been active] very much in the charitable giving realm. Recently I’ve come off a lot of boards in Madison and made my decision to focus more in our industry. So I serve on two of the different educational foundations. [In causes,] two really important things for me are literacy and [access to] food. If you can read, that gives you access – you can read stories to entertain yourself and you can learn and advance in wherever you’re at. … And if your belly isn’t full, you can’t be the human you’re meant to be. Second Harvest is a huge love of mine here in our area — it’s one of the largest food banks in Wisconsin, probably second to Milwaukee. It serves the seven-county area stemming out of Dane County. 

Sports or hobbies you enjoy? 

I’m a Cubs fan, so when I got to Des Moines I was thrilled to learn that the Triple-A team was there. You have a wonderful [ballpark] facility there — we’re so lucky. I’m very much a bicycle enthusiast and I like to hike. I enjoy my dogs.

 

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About Homesteaders Solutions Group 

Homesteaders Solutions Group currently includes three companies: eFuneral Solutions, Domani’s Pre-Need Planning Center, and Domanicare, a text-based grief support tool. 

The first brand, eFuneral Solutions, was launched in October 2019 during the National Funeral Directors Association convention, and currently has 406 active locations nationwide. Sales through the online funeral planning and funding platform as of the end of November were more than $6 million, and the company has provided quotes for more than 1 million funerals since its launch.