SCI Building
1929 Allen Pkwy, Houston, TX
Service Corporation International (SCI)
World’s Largest Funeral Company and listed on the New York Stock Exchange
Click here for current SCI Stock Price
Click here for SCI’s securities filings
The following Seattle area funeral homes are owned by SCI, occasionally through subsidiary corporations such as Uniservice Corporation, incorporated in Oregon.
Big corporate owners usually keep the familiar names of local funeral homes, even though the original owners are long gone. For example, Acacia Memorial Park was incorporated in Washington in 1926 by the Greater Seattle Masonic Lodge. The name Acacia holds a special significance for Freemasons. ( Acacia tree in Freemasonry. ) While the Masons sold the cemetery the following year in 1927, it remained under local ownership until it was acquired in a frenzy of corporate buying by The Loewen Group, Inc. during the 1990s. In January 2002, Alderwoods Group, Inc. was formed when Loewen Group emerged from bankruptcy, and Alderwoods operated Acacia until 2006, when SCI acquired Alderwoods in a deal worth $1.2 billion.
Under SCI’s ownership, Acacia Memorial Park operates as a “foreign” corporation doing business in Washington. A foreign corporation is just a corporation which is incorporated under the laws of a different state or nation. They are required to register an resident agent with the Washington Secretary of State’s office in order to do business within the state. The in-state agent is often a corporation also. In the case of Acacia, the registered agent for SCI is C T Corporation System, Inc., a well known Delaware corporation operating as a foreign corporation in all states other than Delaware, where it is a domestic corporation. In order for C T Corporation to operate as a registered agent in Washington State, it too must have a registered agent, who is an individual registered with the Secretary of State.
Why does all this matter? Know with whom you are dealing before a body is removed from the place of death. It is almost impossible to switch funeral homes without incurring a significant expense if you find you have made a bad initial choice.
Name of Local Funeral Establishment |
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An Oregon State Corporation |
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