When you are considering end-of-life burial options, cremation is one that some people request. The idea may leave you squeamish, but curious. Because you feel squeamish about cremation, you may also be inclined to avoid asking questions about it when visiting or driving by a funeral home. Have no fear; there are other ways to determine if the funeral home has a crematory on the property without having to discuss all the details with the staff.

Smoke and Extra Smokestacks

Driving by a funeral home that has a crematorium, you may notice a couple of smokestacks. Some are for the heating and ventilation ducts of the building, while others are for the crematorium. Some heat, steam, and pressure from the crematory ovens has to go somewhere. Since it cannot be ventilated into the heating ducts of the building, it is ventilated outward. Plumes of white to light gray smoke are common.

Licenses Posted on Display

As you walk into the funeral home, either in the doorway or on a wall within the main hallway or close to an office, there should be framed licenses for the crematorium. No funeral home can incinerate a body without a license because there are state regulations and funeral restrictions on these processes. Besides recognizing the crematorium from outside, the licenses are a sure tip-off once you enter.

Urns for Sale

A cabinet full of urns for sale is another good indicator that the funeral home you are visiting has a crematorium. Because they offer cremation services, it stands to reason that they also offer urns for the ashes. The prices you see on the urns, by the way, are just the prices for the urns and not the cost of the cremation services plus the urn. If they have a catalog of urns you can order and purchase through the funeral home along with the urns on display, you can bet that this funeral home definitely has a crematorium.

The Funeral Home Is Particularly Warm All Year Long

While crematoriums generally contain most of the heat within their chambers, they still exude some radiant heat. You can tell by walking through a funeral home if a crematorium is present and if it is currently on the job, as it were. The funeral home is consistently and particularly warm all year long, and the closer you get to the side of the building where the ovens are, the hotter it gets.

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