Goliath Caskets is a company in Indiana that makes specialized caskets – for the obese. With dangerously rising obesity levels among Americans, who could say they didn’t see this coming?

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta says that one-third of U.S. adults are obese. Among the children and teens, the rate of obesity is at 17%. It’s no surprise then that several businesses have started to cater to the overweight – clothing, footwear, cars, airlines and now, as a generation of obese people begins to die, the need for extra large caskets has also become reality. Goliath Caskets was set up in 1990, specializing in large-sized caskets. However, over the years even the ‘normal’ sized casket manufactured by them has gotten larger. Owner Keith Davis says that when they first started, 36 inches was the widest one they made. But now they’re up to 52 inches wide and the casket can hold a person who weighs as much as 1,000 pounds. About half-a-dozen to a dozen of their biggest caskets are sold each year, as well as more than 200 slightly smaller ones. Read More »

The mother of all DIY projects has arrived. And this one involves making something you, and only you will ever use. Your coffin.

A class that teaches people to build their own caskets is indeed available in Grand Marais, northern Minnesota. It is run by a forty-five year-old professional wood worker, Randy Schnobrich. The three-day course costs around $750, $470 of which is spent on materials alone. Participants are taught and supervised while they construct a coffin from cabinet grade pine, an inch in thickness.

The USP of this class, apart from building coffins of course, is the fact that very few power tools are used. Most of the construction work is done using hand tools such as planes and saws, as opposed to heavy machinery. Schnobrich feels that the use of hand tools is, in some ways, the very essence of the school.

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