Burying on a budget, the plain pine box

And it's Kosher too

By PAUL HAIST

article created on: 2010-03-22T00:00:00

If you shop around the Web for a basic wood casket that meets traditional Jewish burial standards, you might be surprised to find that a simple pine box can cost a lot of money.

A traditional Jewish casket contains no metal parts, not even screws or nails. Also, they are generally simple in form—modest and dignified cabinetry.

There’s a company in the Midwest that builds wood caskets that are simple but handsome—suitable for a traditional Jewish burial—but they cost $2,800.

They look very nicely put together.  But $2,800?

If part of a traditional Jewish burial is to avoid ostentation, $2,800, even at today’s prices, might be testing the limits of tradition, especially if you consider the true cost of a simple casket.

Crosscut Hardwoods, a  specialty wood store in Portland that sells mostly to professional cabinetmakers and other woodworkers currently charges $1.20 per linear foot for a 1-inch by 6-inch white pine board. Say it takes four 7-foot by 6-inch by 1-inch boards to build each of the four long sides of a basic casket and 16 lineal feet to build the two end pieces. That seems like a roomy casket.

That’s 128 linear feet, which, at $1.20 a foot, would cost $153.

At that price, the Midwest casket maker would be marking up his product more than 1,800 percent over the material cost.

Of course, there is other overhead. If we allow $250 for labor, physical plant, insurance and so on per casket, that casket maker is netting about $2,400 for his pine box.

When the time comes to say good-bye to a loved one, it can be difficult not to spend more than we might if circumstances were different and we had more time.

However, a southern Oregon man has a product that is elegant in its simplicity, meets Jewish requirements and is offered at a good price. Some assembly is required.

Paul Firnstein of Ashland founded Ark Wood Caskets with a friend in 1993 after building a couple of simple wood caskets for a local need. That led to requests from others and the creation of the company of which he is now the sole owner.

Firnstein’s pine caskets are shipped to the buyer unassembled. He says he ships all over the United States, “about 50-50” to Jewish and other religions and groups including Muslims, Christians,  green-living advocates and what Firnstein noted was a growing number of families that want to create home funerals during difficult financial times.

“My main goal was to supply the Jewish community with a casket that exactly meets their needs,” he said.

He noted that some makers of caskets offered as kosher actually use metal staples to hold the sides together.

Firnstein’s caskets contain no metal; they’re held together with self-gluing dowels that are easily tapped into place. He points out that the glue—soy-based PureBond, made by Columbia Forest Products of Klamath Falls—contains no formaldehyde or other toxins.

Also, the rope handles on the casket wrap around its underside to provide additional support.

Firnstein sells his kosher casket for $499, plus shipping. That’s $100 less than it sold for a year ago.

For more information about Ark Wood caskets, visit the company’s Web site, arkwoodcaskets.com.