The Business of Death: How Cake Helps Consumers Navigate Mortality

One day, you will die. Unfortunately, in the West, people often fear or avoid this fact. Death and grief can be monumental emotional loads, but logistically, Cake is here to help. Cake is a startup launched in 2015 which helps consumers navigate mortality and end-of-life planning (Dealroom, n.d PR Newswire 2021). They provide funeral home searching services, provide access to media about death, loss and grief, and help loved ones with the financial, emotional, and logistic elements of death, including funerals, grief and healing (Cake n.d.). Cake can be, at a minimum, a catalyst for conversation and learning. At best, it is an essential resource for grieving families and friends to use when they need essential support. 

Cake’s business model prioritizes a free service because the founders believe that Cake should be accessible to all. Their profit comes from paid promotion of affiliate partners (Cake n.d.). This means that partners, such as funeral homes, pay to promote their services on the website. People who are grieving, then, are recommended to use this service. The limitations to this are that it favors certain services over others, calling into question how one can trust recommended services, knowing that certain services pay to promote on Cake’s platform. However, this is still a net positive because when one is dealing with the logistics of the death of a loved one, it can be incredibly helpful to have a program that offers a neat summary of services and information. They were also the first end-of-life company to use AI and natural language processing back in 2021 (PR Newswire 2021). An edge on the evolution of technology can signify an advantage for the business and its users; Cake appears to always be on the cusp of something new. 

Currently, Cake holds a high market position. Its partnerships with several Massachusetts hospitals imply a positive trustworthiness between the startup and the medical industry (Cake n.d.). Adding to its ethos is the oversubscription in the investing round (PR Newswire 2021). While this is not always indicative of a successful startup, the market share Cake captures is too great to ignore. While there have been end-of-life startups before, such as Grace, which provides emotional support after the death of a loved one, and Willing, which provides editable estate planning documents, Cake provides these services and more—including funeral home discovery, end-of-life planning, will creation, and specific after death requests. It is impossible to ignore the practicality and potential for growth of the service (New York Times 2016).

However, it is also impossible to ignore there is something slightly dystopian about the scenario presented. ‘Shopping online’ for services regarding the death of a loved one, can ease a logistic burden, but also has implications on moral and societal concerns (New York Times 2016). Is this how we, as a society, want to move forward in dealing with death? While there are certainly limitations and eerie implications about the idea of an ‘end-of-life business’ itself, it is important to note that this idea is not necessarily a novelty. The funeral industry has annual profits totaling $16.096 billion (NFDA 2024). Therefore, the issue at hand is not a matter of whether the business of death should exist–it already does. One may argue, though, that Cake’s business model is inherently immoral because it suggests certain services (while ignoring other services) while people are emotionally vulnerable. While this is certainly a limitation of the model, the business provides more value than harm. Death can be difficult to navigate, so a service like Cake can ease some of the burden. Grieving families are faced with immense pressure, and even simply having a free information hub to help them move forward can be a game changer. 

The practical implications of the service, then, are an overhaul of end-of-life planning. While a for-profit startup for dealing with death has its moral implications, such as depersonalizing the grieving process due to the online nature of the service, and the potential bias of recommended services due to Cake’s business model, it is overall a beneficial service in that it provides an accessible hub of information for those who are grieving and planning. Further, though the service may depersonalize the experience of grieving, it can also create a sense of community. Everyone will deal with death, but you do not need to be grieving alone. Services that balance the raw human emotion of death with novel technology such as Cake can provide ease of planning, which can help loved ones and those planning for death to focus on their main task: grieving.

References 

Cake. "Cake Closes Fresh Round of Funding." Cake, January 28, 2020. https://www.joincake.com/cake-closes-fresh-round-of-funding/.

Cake. "Cake Raises $3.7M to Expand End-of-Life Planning Offerings Amidst Growing Demand." PR Newswire, July 21, 2021. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/cake-raises-3-7m-to-expand-end-of-life-planning-offerings-amidst-growing-demand-301338285.html.

Cake. "Company." Accessed October 5, 2024. https://www.joincake.com/company/.

Cake. "FAQs." Accessed October 5, 2024. https://www.joincake.com/faq/.

Cake. "Home." Accessed October 5, 2024. https://www.joincake.com.

Dealroom. "Cake (joincake.com)." Accessed October 5, 2024. https://app.dealroom.co/companies/cake_joincake_com_.

Pillar VC. "Cake." Accessed October 5, 2024. https://www.pillar.vc/companies/cake/.

Kadlec, Dan. "Start-Ups for the End of Life." The New York Times, November 2, 2016. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/03/business/start-ups-for-the-end-of-life.html.

National Funeral Directors Association. "Statistics." Accessed October 5, 2024. https://nfda.org/news/statistics.