Imagine a loved one passing away right when you are hundreds of miles away from home. As if the sudden grief wasn’t heavy enough of a burden, you also have to quickly arrange and pay for a funeral service when you can’t be physically there yourself. Because of the distance, you also have no idea if your money is being spent wisely or if a service will give you your money’s worth.
Many Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) have already faced this same exact scenario. It is no easy task—having to iron out all the logistics, details, and payments of saying farewell to a loved one so far away. These problems were only exacerbated at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic when lockdowns made it difficult for people to leave their homes.
It’s a scenario that desperately needs a solution—one that the Philippines’ first and only funeral service marketplace app Onora is now providing Filipinos everywhere.
Founded in 2021 by funeral industry veteran Benjie Dychangco (whose family has worked in the funeral business for over a century), Onora was originally intended to accommodate the funeral needs of OFWs but has now expanded to offer more services to the general market on its platform. Today, the app carries over 500 funeral service partners, offering a wide array of services such as burial, cremation, obituaries, flowers, catering, and photography. Payments for these services can be made conveniently through mobile wallets and credit cards.
The need for Onora and its services is backed by statistics. The Philippines records about 2 deaths every minute. This corresponds to an average of 2,409 deaths per day.
Onora already has its share of satisfied customers. “My sick kuya died on a Saturday evening and I was out of town when I got the news,” a user once shared. “My sister-in- law and the family wanted cremation ASAP, so I checked the Onora App, searched, and chose
a cremation service. In less than 15 minutes, I paid for the service, they picked up the remains
of my kuya for the cremation, and by 6 am the next day, his ashes were back home in a beautiful urn.”
Helping ease the grieving process
With the Dychangco family having built a legacy in the funeral industry, Benjie also personally witnessed the grief and hardship OFWs go through when arranging a funeral from abroad. Dychangco then knew that the industry was ripe for a new digital solution. Naturally, Onora’s tagline is ‘Where tradition meets innovation’.
It was also fitting that Onora launched in July 2021 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. With prolonged lockdowns, people were unable to travel back home. This distance also made it difficult to coordinate a funeral.
Onora came at a time when everything was going digital except for services that people so urgently needed. Naturally, finding a funeral service through the app is a no-brainer:
1) Open the Onora App.
2) Click what kind of service you’re looking for.
3) Search for a service provider.
4) Select the service package which reflects inclusion and price.
5) Fill out details and book.
6) Pay using digital payment channels and wait to receive a QR Code.
7) Present QR Code to the merchant for service.
Onora not only provides efficiency but also transparency. The app readily displays the different prices, pictures, and service inclusions of different service packages. By having a variety of merchants on the platform, families can easily compare prices and packages to find the one that’s right for them.
Getting to the market
Of course, building the Onora app wasn’t an easy process. The Onora team must first back its app’s services by thoroughly vetting its partner merchants. Onora’s onboarding process for merchants includes periodically conducting physical checks and visits to merchants. Onora’s admin back office also checks a merchant’s dashboards to ensure they’re on top of things. Finally, the app also has a rating and review system to track customer satisfaction.
Yet it isn’t just ensuring the quality of the merchants that is a challenge. Because death is such a heavy topic, the app itself can be difficult to market.
“People don’t welcome death but thanks to the pandemic they’re more aware that this can happen at any time,” said Dychangco. “The next stage of the campaign is to make people aware that a funeral arrangement is not an easy task as it involves a lot of factors and legwork plus the aggravation of grief. Hopefully, once the public is made aware of this fact, they will come to realize the value of Onora in terms of convenience, transparency, and expediency.”
According to Dychangco, the team’s efforts at marketing Onora today are aimed at making the app top of mind when a need arises. That is why the Onora team takes special care to not only onboard an increasing number of funeral service providers but also maintain regular exposure in both social and mainstream media.
Building a much-needed solution
Though the Onora app was only formally launched in July 2021 there has already been a lot of progress, with the platform providing services to a steadily growing user base.
Merchants also stand to benefit from working with Onora. Because the Onora app can be used anywhere in the world (with OFWs being the app’s initial target market) businesses working with Onora easily expand their reach. So far, Dychangco and his team have helped boost the business of funeral service providers all over Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. The Onora team is now even targeting partnering with local government units and hospitals in the future to expand its services even further.
Of course, the Onora team has no plans of stopping anytime soon. The platform is already in talks with foreign entities interested in replicating the Onora business model and white labelling its concept.
“An American company who is interested in Onora commented, ‘We are currently in the conceptualization stage of a similar business model but you are far ahead of us since you already have a working and operating platform’,” shared Dychangco.
Despite all its recent successes, however, Dychangco shares that what Onora values most is its ability to help people in their time of need. Their commitment to providing efficient but compassionate service becomes apparent in feedback from their users.
One user named Mona Liza Dalit shared that Dychangco and his team personally oversaw their father’s wake when they booked a service through Onora. “The Onora team made us feel as if we were their only client during that time. Benjie Dychangco visited us practically every day making sure that everything is in order,” Dalit shared. “We were treated like we have known each other for a long time and was even surprised that he has given us so much attention, not just during the wake but also until interment.”
In a time of intense grief, Onora was there to remind its users they were not alone. For Dychangco, that has made all their effort worth it.