Ask to see the business card of one of the 30 employees who work for John Loyless at his eponymous funeral home, and you might notice something. No one has a title under their name — not even Loyless himself.
That underscores a key point about Loyless and the funeral home business he started with one employee back in 1987.
“Whether you’re directing traffic in the parking lot, or directing the funeral inside, it’s all important,” Loyless says.
Since 1994, Loyless Funeral Homes has offered Tampa Bay residents compassionate guidance during some of the most difficult times of their lives (before that, Loyless served clients only through his Florida Mortuary & Crematorium in Seminole Heights).
With a full-service funeral home and crematorium in Land O’Lakes and an Arrangement Center in the Pebble Creek Collection shopping center (behind Kobe Steak House) off Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. in New Tampa, Loyless offers clients a place close to home where they can take the necessary steps: transporting and preparing their loved one, burying or cremating them, and gathering people to honor their life in a proper ceremony.
In an industry now dominated by large corporations, Loyless remains one of the few family-owned businesses that offers value and quality. When customers come to Loyless Funeral Homes, the employees who meet with them not only get to design a unique funeral, but also serve as guides and counselors, helping families sift through their memories amidst their grief and find the perfect way to memorialize the life of their departed loved one.
“It’s a critical moment in a lot of people’s lives,” says Loyless.
Loyless grew up in Brandon and first became interested in this field when, as a student at USF, he got a part time job at a friend’s father’s funeral home. Realizing that the profession dovetailed with his inclination to help people, he left USF and studied mortuary sciences at Miami Dade Community College, graduating with his Associate in Science (A.S.) degree in Mortuary Science in 1985.
He then interned for a year with a local funeral home company before he established his business first as the Florida Mortuary & Crematorium brand in 1987 in Seminole Heights. He opened Loyless Funeral Homes in Land O’ Lakes in 1994, and the Arrangement Center in Pebble Creek followed three years ago.
“It’s convenient for families who live here in New Tampa and Wesley Chapel,” Loyless explains. Although you can do the same things at the Land O’ Lakes facility, the Arrangement Center provides a neighborhood place on BBD. where grieving families can sit down with staff members to discuss everything from flowers, readings and music to officiants and ways to memorialize loved ones. A large-screen television in a tastefully muted conference room serves as a virtual showroom for families to view catalogs and samples of caskets and urns, and examples of ways to memorialize loved ones hang on the walls.
So Many Options
Loyless employees can help direct bereaved families through a plethora of options. For the burial, families can choose from immediate, graveside services, visitations or memorial services, which can be organized at several venues from Loyless Funeral Homes itself to local churches to family homes. Those who choose cremation also can have graveside services at interment or choose to scatter ashes or keep them.
Many also opt to memorialize loved ones through a video tribute, online memory wall or keepsake stationery. For veterans, Loyless Funeral Homes can arrange everything from a riderless horse and military band to memorial plots.
The company also helps growing numbers of people preplan and prepay for their own funerals, something Loyless says comes as a relief to the family left behind, as they no longer have to guess at what music their loved one might have wanted played, for example, as well as other details.
One big change Loyless says he has seen in recent years is the increasing number of ways in which people choose to retain a small part of their loved ones. People are not only turning to cremation in greater numbers than before, they also are thinking beyond the traditional urn. Some opt for smaller repositories, so each sibling can share part of their parent, for example, while others want jewelry — called memory glass — that they can wear that can contain a portion of the ashes. Another popular item is a “thumbie,” jewelry that features an imprint of a departed loved one’s thumb.
Another change is the increase in number of non-religious funerals over the past 5-10 years, Loyless says. “We serve more people today that are unchurched, who say, ‘We want a celebration of life without a religious service.’” All the directors on Loyless’ staff are trained in officiating services for people who do not want clergy present. For those who do, Loyless also can make those arrangements.
Because the Tampa Bay area is one that so many people move into from so many other places, Loyless and his funeral directors also have served at enough funerals to learn about the nuances of the different cultures they serve. Families are often pleasantly surprised to learn that Loyless funeral directors have a working knowledge of faraway religious customs and traditions, as well as a willingness to listen and learn more.
“When you’re in a metro area with such diverse cultures, it’s important to be open and respectful,” says Loyless. “We listen.”
Loyless himself is a New Tampa local, having lived in Hunter’s Green since the early ’90s with his wife, Starr (who also is the company’s bookkeeper). Their daughters attended Hunter’s Green Elementary, Louis Benito Middle School and Paul R. Wharton High. Today, the older daughter, Brittni, 28, is studying mortuary science while her sister, Alexia, 25, attends medical school. The family’s deep roots in the community and their involvement serves as a calling card for area residents, and Loyless doesn’t take that responsibility lightly.
“When a family calls us, one of the most important things is that we want them to feel confident that they made the right choice,” says Loyless, who adds that one way he can ensure that is by hiring the right people to serve his clients’ needs.
“We have wonderful, long-term people who have been with us a long time,” says Loyless. “You can get two people with the same resume but you can see when you work with them if they are passionate about people and about those we serve. We can teach people how to do the job, but we can’t teach people to care. I’m always looking for that personality — that person who cares about other people first and foremost.”
Loyless Funeral Home is located at 5310 Land O’ Lakes Blvd., and the New Tampa Arrangement Center is at 19651 BBD Blvd., Suite E-2. For more information and pricing, visit LoylessFuneralHomes.com, call 996-6610 (Land O’Lakes) or the New Tampa Arrangement Center at 991-7500.
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