The London Cremation Company

What The London Cremation Company does

The London Cremation Company Plc (LCC) is a UK private operator of crematoria and, at one site, a cemetery, serving bereaved families via funeral director partnerships. Founded in 1900 and registered in England and Wales (company number 00612939), LCC is wholly owned by The Cremation Society of Great Britain, a registered charity established in 1874 by Sir Henry Thompson, personal surgeon to Queen Victoria. The company operates six crematoria: Woking (Britain's first, 1885), Golders Green (London's first, 1902, Grade II listed), St Marylebone (1937, acquired 1991), Banbury (1999), Garden of England in Sittingbourne, Kent (2003), and Thames View in Gravesend, Kent (2017, the only site offering burials). A seventh crematorium is in development at Lee-on-the-Solent, Hampshire.

LCC's core revenue comes from cremation fees charged transactionally to funeral directors, who invoice families; supplementary revenue is generated from memorial products (Book of Remembrance entries, columbarium niches, memorial benches, tree and shrub dedications, granite boulders, wall tablets, sanctum vaults, keepsake jewellery) sold directly to families, with financing facilitated through a partnership with Funeral Safe. The company does not sell direct to end consumers; all cremation services route through the UK funeral director network, with families identified and supported by crematorium staff. Notable technology investment includes the installation of state-of-the-art multi-fuel cremators at Woking (hydrogen, gas, electric capable) with energy-recovery systems feeding building heat, and a planned digital portal for funeral director partners. Headcount is 51-100 staff across six sites plus head office at Golders Green.

Recent strategic activity is incremental rather than transformational: development of the seventh crematorium at Lee-on-the-Solent, the multi-fuel cremator rollout at Woking, and a planned funeral director portal. Four of six sites hold Greener Globe Gold sustainability awards, and the Metal Recycling Scheme directs cremation-derived metal proceeds (donated to local charities, with FY2024-25 donations referenced at approximately £99,000 to £399,000 in source data) to hospices, bereavement charities, and community organisations. Management is led by Managing Director Steve Gant (40+ years in cremation) and Finance Director Adanta Anderson, with a long-tenured board that experienced one non-executive departure in September 2025.

Name

The London Cremation Company

Legal name

The London Cremation Company Plc

Website

https://thelondoncremation.co.uk

Company type

Private

Founded year

1900

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

51–100 employees

Short description

The London Cremation Company Plc operates six crematoria across London, Surrey, Oxfordshire, and Kent, delivering cremation, burial, and memorial services to bereaved families through UK funeral director partnerships. Founded 1900 and owned by the Cremation Society of Great Britain charity.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Funeral and Cremation Services

NAICS

Cemeteries and Crematories (812220), Death Care Services (8122)

akta.pro primary industry

Places of Worship & Religious Facilities Operations (Cemeteries, Retreat Centers, Pilgrimage Sites) (BPAGAJAL)

akta.pro secondary industry

Bereavement & Grief Support Services (Family Aftercare) (HSABAFAI)

Keywords

• Cremation services
• Memorial services
• Funeral services
• Burial services
• Crematoria operations

Headquarters

HQ city

London

HQ country

United Kingdom

HQ region

Europe

Offices7 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Infrastructure, Others

Revenue model

1. Cremation fees: LCC charges cremation fees directly to funeral directors, who include the cost on their invoice to families. This is the primary revenue stream for all six crematorium locations.
2. Memorial products and services: Families can purchase memorial options including trees, roses, benches, boulders, wall tablets, columbarium niches, Book of Remembrance entries, memorial cards and booklets, and jewellery. These are sold directly to families and financed through a partnership with Funeral Safe.
3. Metal Recycling Scheme: Metals recovered from the cremation process are cleaned, valued and sold for recycling with family consent. Proceeds are donated to local charities. This generates no direct revenue but supports community relations.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels4 records

Core offering

The London Cremation Company owns and operates six crematoria across South East England and London (Woking, Golders Green, St Marylebone, Banbury, Garden of England, and Thames View), providing cremation services, burial services at Thames View, and a comprehensive range of memorial products including Books of Remembrance, columbarium niches, memorial gardens, benches, and keepsake jewellery. The company serves bereaved families directly through its crematorium sites and works in partnership with funeral directors across the UK to deliver services.

Product overview

The London Cremation Company operates six crematoria across the UK under a unified brand: Woking (established 1885, the UK's first crematorium), Golders Green (1902, London's first), St Marylebone (1937), Banbury (1999), Garden of England (2003), and Thames View (2017). The company's core offering is cremation services combined with comprehensive memorialization options including Books of Remembrance, columbarium niches, memorial gardens with tree/shrub dedications, benches, plaques, boulders, and vaults. Thames View additionally offers cemetery and burial services. The company also has a seventh crematorium in development at Lee-on-the-Solent. All sites provide memorial advisory services and partner with Funeral Safe for memorial financing options.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Woking Crematorium UK's first crematorium, offering cremation services, memorial gardens, columbarium niches, and a Book of Remembrance. Notable memorials include Alan Turing, Thomas Hardy, and Jeannette Pickersgill.
• Golders Green Crematorium London's first crematorium featuring two service chapels (West Chapel seating 140, East Chapel seating 45), Grade II listed building, 12-acre Grade I listed memorial gardens, three historic columbaria, Jewish Shrine of Remembrance, and Chapel of Memory with Books of Remembrance.
• St Marylebone Crematorium North London crematorium with Italianate architecture, chapel seating 140, internal and external columbaria, memorial gardens including a Willow Garden, and a Book of Remembrance in the Remembrance Room.
• Banbury Crematorium Oxfordshire countryside crematorium featuring an airy chapel with countryside views seating 100, award-winning mature memorial gardens, Book of Remembrance, and various memorial options including rose trees, benches, and columbarium vaults.
• Garden of England Crematorium Kent crematorium featuring a modern chapel overlooking memorial gardens with a stunning lake, four seasonal dispersal lawns, Book of Remembrance in a Kentish Oast house-style room, and diverse memorial options.
• Thames View Crematorium and Cemetery The newest LCC site offering both cremation and burial services. Features a chapel seating 150, formal cemetery with views of the River Thames, Babies and Children's Garden, Book of Remembrance, and extensive memorial options including scatter lawns.
• Memorial Products and Services Memorialization options available at all crematoria including Book of Remembrance entries, columbarium niches, tree and shrub dedications, memorial benches, granite boulders, wall tablets, sanctum vaults, memorial cards, and keepsake jewellery. Financed through a partnership with Funeral Safe.
• Cemetery and Burial Services Burial services offered exclusively at Thames View Crematorium and Cemetery, with a formal cemetery area laid to lawn with views overlooking the River Thames.

Quantifiable outcome

• Nearly 80% of people in the UK now choose cremation over burial
• +2 more outcomes

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature1 record

Partnerships

Three partnerships are on record, tiered core and minor.

• Funeral SafecoreGTM or Marketing PartnerFuneral Safe is an FCA-regulated specialist credit company supporting funeral and memorial purchases with finance options from 1-5 years. LCC is partnered with Funeral Safe across all six crematoria, offering families financing for memorial purchases. Families can check eligibility via the Funeral Safe website or with crematorium staff. The partnership enables families to spread memorial costs over time.
• Metal Recycling Scheme (specialist firm)minorOthersA specialist firm is used to clean, value, and sell metals recovered from the cremation process (with family consent). The proceeds are donated to local charities. This firm handles the sensitive procedure of processing recovered metals.
• Local charities (Metal Recycling Scheme beneficiaries)minorOthersEach year LCC donates proceeds from its Metal Recycling Scheme to local charities linked to people such as hospices, care homes, and homeless charities. For 2025, beneficiaries include Katharine House Hospice, Banbury & District Samaritans, Grief Encounters, Trussell Trust, Time for the Homeless, My Shining Star Children's Cancer Charity, Noah's Ark Children's Hospice, Resources for Autism, Beams Charity, Valley Hospital Charity, Cruse Bereavement Support Surrey North, and Your Sanctuary.

Scale indicators7 records

Recent moves14 records

Expansion highlights6 records

Emerging players

• Pure Cremation: Pure Cremation is a UK direct-cremation provider that bypasses funeral directors entirely with a low-cost, unattended model. It is a partial-overlap emerging competitor that pulls lower-spend families out of traditional funeral-director-then-crematorium flows relevant to LCC.
• CPJ Field & Co: CPJ Field is a long-established independent UK funeral director with selective crematorium operations, similar in heritage and quality positioning to LCC's sites. It is comparable as a peer-channel customer of LCC's crematoria and as an owner-operator of competing facilities.

Broad incumbents

• Dignity plc: Dignity is the UK's largest listed funeral services group, combining ~800 funeral homes with a meaningful crematoria estate. Its broader funeral-services portfolio overlaps with LCC's funeral-director channel, though it competes at scale rather than focused crematoria.
• Funeral Partners: Funeral Partners is a consolidator of UK independent funeral directors, now part of the wider Westerleigh group, giving it both funeral-director and crematoria capabilities. It represents the consolidated-buy channel into LCC's crematoria and a competitor in adjacent regions.
• Co-op Funeralcare: Co-op Funeralcare is one of the UK's largest funeral providers and operates crematoria and cemeteries. As a national multi-service incumbent, it competes with LCC both via funeral director network reach and through any owned crematoria in the same regions as LCC's sites.

Direct peers

• Memoria Ltd: Memoria is a UK independent crematoria operator with a comparable focus on building and running modern crematoria outside London. Its mid-scale site portfolio and architectural-led approach make it a useful operational benchmark for LCC's newer non-London sites.
• GreenAcres Group: GreenAcres operates natural burial parks and associated cremation services across the UK. Its nature-led, sustainability-branded positioning directly overlaps with LCC's Greener Globe Gold Awards and Woking multi-fuel cremator roadmap.
• Westerleigh Group: Westerleigh is the UK's largest independent crematoria group (20+ sites), operating in the same death-care/cemetery sub-segment as LCC with a similar regional-build-and-operate model. It is the closest publicly referenced independent comparator for LCC's six-site portfolio.

Others

• Service Corporation International: SCI is the largest North American funeral/cemetery operator. Similar to StoneMor, it is a sector benchmark rather than a direct competitor, providing public-market context for death-care unit economics relevant to LCC's crematorium network.
• StoneMor Partners: StoneMor is a US death-care and cemetery operator. While US-only and not a direct competitor, it is a useful sector comparator for valuation multiples and cremation/cemetery operating benchmarks relevant to LCC's estate.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Facebookfacebook.com/profile.php

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles11 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about The London Cremation Company