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Our Story
Pat & Barry Brewer
C. P. "Pat" Brewer after the death of Mrs.
Gracy Garnett established Brewer & Son Funeral
Homes in 1965, in Brooksville, Florida. The
Garnett Funeral Home, at that time, was the only
funeral
establishment in Brooksville. Pat saw an
opportunity to go into business for himself and,
thus, did so. In the beginning, he ran the funeral
home, ambulance service, and did his community
service while competing against one other funeral
establishment. Eventually, both funeral homes
would turn the ambulance service over to the
county. In 1974, Pat saw an opportunity to expand
his funeral business to the underdeveloped west
side of the county called Spring Hill. That proved
to be a very successful move because that now has
over 80% of the county's population. In 1980, he
purchased Grace Memorial Gardens Cemetery, later
selling his interest to his partners to
concentrate his energy on the growth of Brewer
Funeral Homes. All of this while raising a family,
leading several civic organizations, being a
trustee at his church, and running three political
campaigns.
In 1984, his son, Barry K. Brewer, joined the
family firm. After several years of self-employment
in the
construction industry, Barry had completed studies
in Mortuary Science at Miami-Dade and Business
Administration at Pasco-Hernando Community College
and University of South Florida. While in Miami
attending Mortuary school, he worked to perfect his
skills in funeral service and became very proficient
in the marketing of prearrangements. After returning
to the family firm, he used those skills to begin
marketing prearrangements in Hernando County. No one
else had become aggressive in the market place so he
basically had a new market to tap into. Through the
next few years, he had developed a self-supporting
prearrangement department. In 1987, Barry took over
the management of the Spring Hill location.
Shortly after Barry began managing the Spring Hill
location, Pat and Barry developed a five/ten year
business plan. It included the addition of two new
funeral home locations and a plan for the growth of
the eastern portion of the county during the first
five years. The ten-year plan included the
acquisition of several established firms.
In 1992, they completed the Seven Hills Chapel and
in 1994 remodeled an 11,000-sq. ft. bank building
into their fourth location and one crematory.
Shortly thereafter, they began making offers on
several local funeral establishments. Although many
appreciated the offers, they were not ready to sell.
So in 1995, the Brewer Funeral Homes and Crematory
was merged with Equity Corp. international (ECI) to
further achieve their ten-year plan. Pat chose to
take a less active role in the day-to-day
activities, but joined the corporate development
team of ECI. Barry, while also on the corporate
development team, chose to continue managing the
firm. While associated with ECI the company grew
from 100 funeral homes to 326 funeral homes and 18
cemeteries in 35 states and 1 Canadian province. The
growth had been substantial and it had been a
complete team effort, company wide, with everyone
playing a big role in it's success. However, August
6, 1998 ECI announced its merger with Service Corp.
international. As of 1999, SCI owned and operated
approximately 3600 funeral homes, 500 cemeteries,
and 175 crematories in 18 countries on 5 continents
with annualized revenues approaching $3 billion and
have been established since the early 60's. In a
company that size, it would be very difficult to
make a true difference in the future of operations
and/or it's growth and it does not work within the
parameters set in the original ten-year plan.
This is the reason for starting FAMILY OWNED SERVICE
COMPANY, INC. (FOSC): to continue the original
Brewer plan, continue to care for families and make
a true difference in the industry.
The first
acquisition of FOSC was completed April 14,2000 with
the purchase of our Orlando location at 115 West
Gore Street.
In February
1999, we entered into litigation with SCI to force
them to allow us to exercise the "first right of
refusal" that we had contractually agreed to with
ECI in 1994. Due to the merger mentioned earlier, we
felt we had the right to buy our funeral homes. On
June 25, 2001 we purchased all three of our funeral
homes and our crematory successfully bringing an end
to the litigation and bringing these properties back
into the family of "Family Owned Service Company".
On July 15,
2003, Mark III Funeral Homes with two locations in
Tampa, Florida was acquired by Family Owned Service
Company. Mark III and the Curry family has a long
history of quality funeral care in the Tampa Bay
area. We are proud to have them join our company.
This acquisition brings our company to 6 locations
in 3 counties. Our plan now is to buy or build
funeral homes between Tampa, Orlando, and
Brooksville/Springhill.
On January
26th 2004 Kurfiss Funeral Homes, was acquired by
Family Owned Services Company. We are proud to have
this 3rd generation funeral home join our family.
this acquisition bregins our company to eight locations
and one crematory in four counties, all with the Brewer
and Sons Funeral Homes and Cremation Services name.
Our plan now is to buy or build funeral homes
between Tampa, Orlando, Clermont Groveland and
Brooksville/Spring Hill.
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