Newcomer Funeral Service Group: Building a Company-Wide Recognition Culture

Newcomer Funeral Service Group is a funeral care organization operating over 50 funeral homes in 10 states. At its core, it’s a family business that has been led by five generations of Newcomers since its establishment in the 1890’s. Its associates, including funeral directors and administrative coordinators, meet with families at the most difficult time in their lives, often through long days, weekends, and nights.

Over the last five years, employee recognition has become a strong focus for the company. For Newcomer, it’s a way of investing in its people. Associates need positive reinforcement from their peers to help them through tough days, and to know they’re serving their communities well.

Before working with Terryberry, Newcomer had no formal recognition program. Recognition was segmented and depended on what individual managers chose to do at their own locations. Managers lacked the tools to recognize their associates consistently, and praise rarely traveled beyond the building where it was earned.

That gap mattered more because of how Newcomer’s teams work. Associates who met at company trainings had no easy way to keep celebrating each other’s wins once they returned to their own markets. In addition, approximately 60% of the workforce is deskless, which makes them harder to reach with digital recognition alone.

The nature of the work added another layer. Meeting with grieving families during long days, weekends, and nights can feel isolating, and Newcomer wanted its people to know they were not facing it alone.

Newcomer partnered with Terryberry to build a consistent, company-wide recognition program. The platform gave managers a shared set of tools and moved recognition from the location level to the whole company. Now a post celebrating an associate in Denver can now be seen by associates in every market.

The program was built around Newcomer’s four core values: excellence, trust, care, and growth. Every recognition that managers and associates give one another is tied to one of those values, so everyday appreciation reinforces the culture Newcomer wants to build.

The company-wide feed became a place for more than praise. Associates from different markets recognize each other for wins, birthdays, and work anniversaries, and Newcomer uses the same space to share company announcements and awards.

Two features helped the program fit Newcomer’s workforce:

• Flexibility. Newcomer learned that associates like to be recognized in different ways. Some enjoy public recognition and others do not, and Terryberry provided the company options to customize the program to fit everyone.
• Printable certificates. For deskless associates, the platform produces certificates that can be posted inside funeral homes, so recognition is visible in the workplace and not only online.

Newcomer has continued the partnership for years, crediting Terryberry’s support staff, which mirrors the level of service Newcomer strives to give the families it serves.

For Newcomer, the program “closed the circle” on recognition. Associates across markets now celebrate each other’s wins, and colleagues from different regions are connecting in ways they haven’t been able to until now.

The clearest proof came during a leadership visit to the Rochester location one February afternoon, during one of the busiest seasons of the year. Recognition certificates hung above the computers throughout the office, showing that associates and managers were recognizing one another. Seeing that, Newcomer’s leadership realized the program was doing something real, and that employees place value on recognition in every form it takes, whether printed, personal, or posted company-wide.