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3 Keys for Your Journey
Business and Community Leaders sharing key principles.
3 Keys for Your Journey
Unlocking Community Impact: Navigating Tradition, Advocacy, and Leadership with Chris Harrison
Unlock the incredible journey of Christopher Harrison Sr., the owner of Heritage Funeral Directors and 4 Points Cremation, as he shares his inspiring story rooted in Northeast Oklahoma City. With nearly three decades in funeral service and 19 years as a business owner, Chris opens up about the evolution of his business and his commitment to making end-of-life arrangements accessible and affordable. His deep dedication to community service is exemplified through his roles on the Millwood Public School Board and his political aspirations. This episode promises rich insights from Chris’s extensive experience and the lessons he’s learned about growth, adaptability, and the power of community involvement.
We also tackle the vital conversation around final arrangements in the African-American community, highlighting the evolving cultural norms and the pivotal role African-American funeral directors have historically played. Chris emphasizes the importance of offering diverse options and understanding the financial considerations that come with funeral planning. From personal anecdotes about his life and career to broader reflections on leadership and advocacy, this episode is a heartfelt exploration of humility, gratitude, and the continuous journey toward personal and professional success. If you’re eager to learn from a leader who is deeply connected to his roots and committed to positive change, this episode is a must-listen.
Thank you for listening! YouTube - @3KeysforYourJourney -Tune in for a new episode every Sunday. Connect with us at www.ocfo.info
Are you ready to unlock your potential? Tune in to Three Keys for your Journey podcast, where business owners share invaluable insights and empowering strategies to guide you towards success. Based in Oklahoma City, our host, greg T Jones, will inspire and motivate you every week. Get ready to join our conversation as we build community together.
Speaker 2:All right, we got Chris Harrison Heritage Funeral Home and Cremation Services, based out of Oklahoma City City, live on the podcast. Thank you, sir, for being here today. Good evening, thank you for having me. I'm glad to have you. Oh my gosh, chris, this is a treat man, we go back a number of years and, man, to have you here on the podcast is quite wonderful. I just had a flashback is quite wonderful. I just had a a flashback.
Speaker 2:Um, your son and I my sons played little league basketball together with coach johnny, coach johnny man, wow felt like, uh, that's been only a few years ago, but man time does go by fast, you've got a college freshman Second semester, freshman Wow, yes, man. Yes, OK, Chris. Most people on the podcast are listening audience. They don't know Chris Harrison is, so I always start out with tell us introduce yourself to our listening audience.
Speaker 3:OK, and you refer to me as Chris Harrison, but my official name, of course, and my legal name is Christopher John Harrison, senior. I always say heavy on the senior, but I do ask that everybody just call me Chris. Born and raised in Northeast Oklahoma city, I'm a product of Millwood public schools, Educated In Arkansas, played a little college football, Oklahoma State University as well, wrapped up my undergrad in mortuary science and funeral service education, went on to get an MBA. In the process of working here in Northeast Oklahoma City one of the oldest funeral firms, Royal Funeral Home, I was able to meet a young lady by the name of Christy Pendleton and shortly thereafter we dated, got married, had a family and we're what? 20? This is year 27. Wow, that's something else interesting about us.
Speaker 2:We share the same years of being married. 98 was a wonderful year.
Speaker 1:It was a great year. It was a great year.
Speaker 2:And you have a wonderful wife, christy as well, thank you.
Speaker 3:And so our oldest I'm a dad of two Oldest is Jaquia Monet. The youngest, of course, would be Christopher Jr. We affectionately refer to him as Deuce. This will be year 30 for me in the funeral service industry. In the funeral service industry this will be year 19 as an owner, and you know I enjoy civic organizations. I served on several boards. I was elected to the school board, millwood Public School Board, served three terms, 15 years, charted a little path politically, ran for House of Representatives here in Oklahoma City as well as city council. I often say they weren't the most successful runs because I didn't win the seat, but the connections that were made from me being a candidate have been invaluable and I feel like I've served my community quite a bit better from these other positions. Not to say that I don't have political ambitions I think that's something that sticks with you if you really care about it but currently I enjoy what I'm doing, and growing our business is something that Christian and I really want to concentrate on here in the very near future.
Speaker 2:To tell us a little bit about the business itself. So tell us a little bit about the business itself.
Speaker 3:Heritage Funeral Home and Cremation Service is now going into, like I said, year 19. Our rebrand is Heritage Funeral Directors and Four Points Cremations, funeral service and now embracing the need for cremation services, not only in Northeast Oklahoma city or in the black community, but in the Oklahoma city community as a whole. It's really a growing sector of people who are choosing cremation as their final disposition following services. So we really want to be able to cater to those who are traditional and non-traditional but, more importantly, continue to offer services a bit more affordable than what is going on in our surrounding area. And that can be a challenge. Work hard enough with your vendors and those who you use to help serve one another. You can find some cost effective ways to pass some benefits on the families, and that's that's just a personal preference that Chrissy and I have.
Speaker 3:We choose to use that approach, and so we are right here in the heart of Northeast Oklahoma city, northeast 13th and Lottie. This, this area, has transitioned, I know, four or five times over the last 50 years, if you will, and so it's seeing a resurgence, it's seeing a renaissance. There's still some areas that need to have a little clean white paint put on them, if you will, but I shared with my wife last week. If anybody asked me about where we are and where we choose to work, I tell them I'm doubling down on Northeast Oklahoma City. I believe in it. So that's kind of us in a nutshell.
Speaker 2:Well, thanks for sharing that One. It's great to get a good perspective not only of yourself, but some of the things that you've been involved in, particularly as it relates to your family. Obviously, our podcast is around keys along your journey, and so I've asked all of our guests you know, as you think back over the many years of business, family man, community man you even talked about making those political opportunities or runs what are some of the things that at least three things, things that you can share with our listening audience that you would say have been keys for your journey.
Speaker 3:Hmm, three keys to the journey. Um, first, you don't know what you don't know, right. So when you start out, um, be open to learning what's out there. Quite often we feel if we're professionals in something or if we're very good at something, even a hobby, that we transition into a business. We feel like our knowledge base is strong enough to carry us. And so what you're not knowing, what you don't know, you can tune out some of the helpful things that will help, that will get you through those rough times and those rough moments.
Speaker 3:I think that's that's key Rules and routines. You just have to have them. You know there has to be a boundary that you set on yourself ethically, what I will and just will not do. And then financially, where's my breaking point? You know they say break even point, but for me it's my breaking point where I just say I can't do that. This is, you know, it's doing a disservice to the family as well as my family. This is, you know, it's doing a disservice to the family as well as my family.
Speaker 3:And then the routine portion. I'm just good habits, and not to say that, that I have a ton of good habits and perfect habits, but I just kind of chase me every day. You know I'm going to be a better version of me every day. Some days are better than others, but you know that those rules and routines.
Speaker 3:And then, lastly, which probably could have jumped out first, is is having some level of faith in what it is you do. Now you can have faith in God, a deity or whichever and I am a man of faith when it comes from a Christian walk but faith in what I do is is is the confidence that I have to get up and go and do it every day, but then the reverence that I have for what I do every day. I tell everybody you only have one time to do this. You don't have a chance to redo it and sometimes it doesn't go the way you want it to go, but it's not because you did not give the effort and have the faith and the reverence in what it is you were doing.
Speaker 2:So, as you talk about that, I mean obviously you made great points in your business because you are dealing with families and transition of someone they've cared about, a loved one. You don't really have the opportunity to do things over again. So what are the things that you've established in your business to try to get it right the first time?
Speaker 3:One to listen to what they're telling you. There's a trend in funeral service now that I'm noticing where young funeral directors and some not so young funeral directors are making the services about their level of performance and notoriety. And that's fine if that is your style, okay, but for me it's more of. I'm trying to make this process as simple as possible, because there's no way to make it painless. That's impossible. But if you can simplify it and Be efficient in the process, you find that families are more apt to talk to you when you're not throwing things at them saying, well, here's what we're going to do, and I don't believe in that. I believe in listening First off.
Speaker 3:Something else I think we've done is we decided to be visible outside of just what we do day to day in the funeral industry.
Speaker 3:There are so many people in this city who, after knowing me for months on end, had no idea that I was in the funeral industry or I was an undertaker or mortician. Well, quite often people think I'm a minister, which I think it's hilarious. But but it it it's if you, if you, can stay vigilant and visible in your community and abroad, it allows individuals to feel comfortable with you when that time comes, because I don't want a kid to only remember me as the guy who buried their mom or their grandmother or grandfather. I want them to remember that's Mr Chris who came to my class, or that's Mr Chris who brought us bikes, you know, to our Boys and Girls Club, or you know something along those lines as well, is something we try to stick with. And then, lastly, we're working on not perfected it by no stretch, but we're working on effective communication. You know it's one part to listen, but then when you come back and you bring back responses to what you're listening to be very effective and be very mindful what it is we're trying to do.
Speaker 2:You made a couple of good points that I want to just tie to One. You know relationships over time, being present, being present in the community, being present with people. It's not mistakenly why I think people think you're a minister, because I think a lot of the work that you do is ministry. When you talk about listening, you talk about then responding and then trying to provide a level of care not only for that family but also for that family's loved one, I think is substantial, because people are what they see, and what they see is someone that has high esteem for the community, lifts people up, makes it easier, I think, to develop a level of trust. So when that time comes not even just when that time comes, even prior to that time come to give you a phone call. What do I need to plan for? What do I need to think about, be thinking about and getting ready for that, because we all I mean we all got to go that way. I mean it's inevitable.
Speaker 3:The conversation we have to have is what final disposition is? What do you want to transpire with your humanly earthly remains once you've been celebrated? Okay, once you've been celebrated, okay. So what I come to in this conversation in the African-American community is you got to communicate options. See, in the early to mid-90s, cremation was reserved for two sides Someone who was quote-unquote poor or homeless in the Black community, that's it.
Speaker 3:That's quote-unquote. Poor in the black community, that's it. That is quote unquote. Poor in the black community, that's it. Or homeless, and homeless even rolled down to individuals who were living in nursing homes, who didn't have family members. So it would just be they don't have anybody, that's it. It's going to be a cremation. And when I started in the industry, we had maybe two or three cremations a year Period. That was it.
Speaker 3:So what I've learned a little further is that when I can express to a family, we can do all of the traditional things we would normally do and once that service is complete, instead of us going to the cemetery, the family will go and celebrate further, be it a repass or family gathering, etc. Quite often get a response you can do that, yes, because we as a community don't understand final disposition. We don't understand what closing out really looks like If we're not in a funeral procession on our way to Trice Hill, hillcrest, arlington, et cetera, places that are germane, oklahoma city for those who are not from here, those spaces that we're accustomed to going to. When given those options, the first thing I see a family's face do is relax, because we all feel an obligation to honor our dead. That's ingrained in our DNA from Africa. That's what we do. We honor this life. We escort that spirit on to the beyond right.
Speaker 3:But we have been so. Funeral service, as in most things of service, now tied so deeply with finances that the first question I get quite often I receive on average 18 to 25 calls a week with this question what's the cheapest service you got and how much is it? Being an African-American funeral home owner when I when I dug into the history of it and found out what role the mortician played from post-Civil War to up including this last presidential election. But if you look at the history, the African-American funeral director has always been a respected businessman, slash leader in his community or her community, excuse me and I took that to heart when I finally learned about Mr, I took that to heart when I finally learned about Mr AG Gaston, mr MJ Edwards you know Mr Black, that's how we call him Mr Black out of Dallas, texas.
Speaker 3:Mr Temple here, the Roth brothers in Oklahoma City, mr Bill McKay. These were strong leaders from a civil rights standpoint, from an educational standpoint. A lot of them were huge when it came to backing education and the growth of education for African Americans. But also I found out that if I can hone in on that a little bit, it forced me to work on my leadership ability and skills.
Speaker 3:Sometimes you just have to step out there and say here's what you do and where your backing comes from is I can stand firm on something because you, I don't need you to do something. I can still go back and fend for me and my family and my business. So if I'm a step out on something I see is wrong in education, I see something that's wrong in the treatment of children, or I see something that's incorrect that may be even surrounded from the police department or from policing of individuals, I feel safe enough to have outside conversations because what I'm doing. Safe enough to have outside conversations because what I'm doing you can't directly impact that versus somebody who may be working for a company whose company's community, because the preacher, the teacher, the undertaker, the lawyer, the doctor, those five professions in the African-American community have always been prevalent, and so I respect that a lot.
Speaker 2:I really appreciate that perspective because I think that's so important for us to understand our history and the role that we play. I think that's so important for us to understand our history and the role that we play, not just in what you do, but who you are and who you are in the community each and every day. That makes a big difference. Yeah, and it counts and it matters. So thank you for that. Christopher J Harrison Sr. Heavy on the seat Heavy on the singer. I'm probably reminding your son of that often.
Speaker 3:I do Anything else that you want to add as we talk about your journey before we wrap up that you'd like to leave with folks out there that are aspiring business owners, been in business for a while but listening to this podcast and and looking for um, some encouragement, um, in business, you're going to have some ups and downs. You're going to have some successes and some learning moments. Um, failure only becomes failure when you don't, when you stop right there. So you're going to have some successes, You're going to have some learning moments.
Speaker 3:But when you hit that high, that pinnacle, when you really feel like you're rocking and rolling, first of all be mindful that it's not you. It's the grace that's been put in you, it's the talent that's been put in you, it's the ability that's been put in you. You didn't create that. So, for me, I pay homage to my Lord for giving me that moment. But also, when I'm at my height, when I mean everything's hitting on all cylinders, that's when I realized you really haven't reached the top. You're simply just beginning. Because those things that were those learning moments. You've probably licked them by now, because you're finally moving on it. So don't think that you're there yet. You're merely just on your way.
Speaker 2:Wow, Okay, Chris. How can people get in contact with you, find out about your business? Maybe they just want to call you and get some personal advice. How?
Speaker 3:do they reach out to you? How do people get in contact with you? So I'm going to work backwards. I do have social media. It's Christopher J Harrison from Facebook, or I think I'm Mr Undertaker on Tik TOK. I'm getting there. Um, mr Undertaker on Instagram, I do know that and on Tik TOK. So, yeah, that's right. Um, but I'm Chris Harrison, here in Oklahoma city heritage funeral directors. Uh, four zero five, four two, four, 50, 100. Uh, as I do with any of my families, this is not lost on anybody. My direct cell phone number is 405-514-7007. Anybody can call me. Anybody can shoot me a text message. I'm going to respond.
Speaker 2:And that's awesome. Well, chris, thank you so much. I will say this and for our listening audience out there, podcast world, you know, if you are looking for to be inspired, encouraged, um, you know, chris just gave his cell phone number. Um, he's on all social media channels his business, but also as a community leader, and so, man, thank you so much for being here uh, giving me an opportunity.
Speaker 3:opportunity and this platform and this spotlight man, and personally, on behalf of my family, thank you for allowing us to serve your family over the years as well.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. We appreciate that, appreciate everything that you do. All right, stay tuned for our next episode. We will see you next time.
Speaker 1:Thanks for joining Three Keys for your Journey. Journey tune in next time for another episode.
