Urns for cremains are 'huggable'

Her Redding, Calif.-based Internet firm sells pillows, teddy bears and other stuffed animals that double as depositories for the ashes of a loved one or pet.

The "huggable urns" are a soft and fuzzy alternative to traditional stone, metal and wood cremains containers that usually sit on fireplace mantels or shelves, or in closets.

"I know people who carry our bears around during the day," Lachini said. "And a lot of my customers sleep with them at night, just like any other stuffed animal. It gives people comfort and healing."

Hold Me Urns is one of a number of niche businesses in the $11 billion funeral industry that offer everything from fireworks to keepsake jewelry as ways to use or display cremated remains.

Experts say that changing religious and cultural mores are fueling a trend that has propelled the U.S. cremations-to-deaths ratio from less than four in 100 during 1964 to about 30 in 100 during 2004.

If recent trends continue, cremation will follow 46 percent of all American deaths by 2025, predicts the Chicago-based Cremation Association of North America.

Several companies that offer unconventional ways to remember the departed have entered the funeral industry.

Eternal Reefs in Decatur, Ga., mixes ashes into hollow concrete "reef balls" that are placed in the ocean to become habitat for marine life. Angels Flight Inc., a Southern California company, shoots off fireworks packed with cremated remains. Houston-based Space Services Inc. loads ashes on commercial rockets and launches them into the heavens.

The idea to put ashes into teddy bears came to Lachini, 53, after her father died in 1998 and his cremated remains were put in a plastic urn and stored in a closet at her mother's home.

"He communicated with me spiritually and said, 'Get me out of here,' " said Lachini, who added that her father still speaks to her.

The idea for huggable urns came to Lachini partly from observing roadside memorials. "When you see where someone has died in an accident, people always leave flowers and teddy bears," she said. "It's as American as apple pie."

Lachini consulted with a San Mateo, Calif., firm to design the huggable-urn line, then sent the specifications to a Chinese manufacturer and ordered 1,800 units for about $18,000.

The urns start at $85. Lachini said she has sold about 300 to customers from Australia to Europe since the business launched its Web site two years ago.

A couple of funeral homes sell the line, and Lachini is in talks with a few more.

Each bear, dog, cat and pillow has a zippered pouch that contains a removable black-velvet bag with "Eternal Love" embroidered with gold thread. The bag is plastic-lined and seals tightly with a Velcro strip "so that the ashes don't leak out," Lachini said. "We tested it by dropping the bag from a second-floor deck."

Sacramento, Calif., psychologist Debra Moore said huggable urns might be "particularly appealing for pets or people who have lost children," although she recognizes that some people might find the notion morbid.

"America is a 'stiff-upper-lip' culture when it comes to death and dying," Moore said. "I don't see a problem with (huggable urns) as long as they're not interfering with a person continuing on, experiencing life, anticipating the future and forging new experiences and relationships after a person has gone through the waves of grief."

Not everyone uses the urns for cremated remains. Chico, Calif., resident Carleen Gates said that after her son, Chris Little, 44, died unexpectedly, she filled her cocoa-colored Huggable Urns teddy bear with pictures, a lock of his hair and his religious medals.

"I thought about putting ashes in there, but I didn't want questions from my grandkids," she said.

Gates likes the convenience and immediacy of having meaningful keepsakes of her son in a form she can take everywhere.

"I'm used to going to a cemetery and putting flowers out," she said. "But this is better. It's like having Chris with me."