Donate in Memory
A Welch & Sons Funeral Services

A brief history of A. Welch & Sons Funeral Directors

Prices
Arranging a funeral

Our Heritage

Alfred Welch, the ‘A’ of A. Welch & Sons, was born in 1876. Like his father and grandfather before him Alfred became a coachman.
Alfred married Ellen Tritton and they had eight sons and two daughters. In time, five of the sons joined their father in business, and so A. Welch & Sons was born – carrying out household removals, taxi work and supplying horses, carriages, and coffin bearers to the four local Funeral Directors in Herne Bay.

One of the sons, Harold, also assisted one of the funeral directors, initially with coffin making and later with arranging and conducting funeral services. When the sons returned from the second World War, and, in 1948 the family decided to undertake funeral arrangements in their own right alongside the other work the company was doing.

Our Premises

Our premises undergo regular improvements and modernisation. 2012 saw the completion of an extensive refurbishment of our mortuary and chapel facilities. Our funeral vehicle fleet is regularly replaced, and we currently run a fleet of bespoke Hybrid Ford vehicles purchased in 2020. A. Welch and Sons remains a family owned, independent funeral directors.

Evolution

When motor vehicles replaced the horse and carriage, our stables at Downs Park, Herne Bay, were converted into workshops, timer stores, and a Chapel of Rest. In 1960 the decision was taken to concentrate solely on funerals. Our premises were continually updated and improved. Refrigerated storage facilities and an embalming theatre were installed and we became the first fully equipped Funeral Directors in the Herne Bay, Beltinge, and Canterbury District. During the 70s we had four private viewing chapels and a private service chapel built. In 1994 we opened a second branch in Burgate, Canterbury.

Our team

We have two full-time Funeral Directors, two full-time Trainee Funeral Directors, five full-time Funeral Service Operatives, one part-time Receptionist, and an in-house Bereavement Counsellor. The current Managing Director is Tim Welch, Alfred’s great-grandson. Tim’s son Oli Welch joined the team in 2017 as a Funeral Service Operative before becoming a Trainee Funeral Director in 2022.
Read more about our bereavement services

Our Fleet of Vehicles

We’re very proud of our Hybrid Ford fleet, but we’re also able to organise alternative Hearses and Limousines. More common examples include Horse-Drawn Hearses and Motorcycle Hearses, but we are also able to source more uncommon vehicles, such as VW Campers and Robin Reliant 3-Wheelers. If you have something else in mind, please speak to us about your requirements and we’ll always do our best to meet them.

Our philosophy

Our philosophy is a simple one: every funeral we arrange is the most important funeral we have ever conducted because it is so important to you. Every person whose funeral arrangements are entrusted to us is somebody’s son or daughter, and, in most cases somebody’s mother or father so we care for them as we would want our own children or parents cared for.

It is a fact that a funeral will always be a sad occasion but that doesn’t mean that it has to be miserable. A funeral should be a celebration of that person’s life, a time to remember the joy they brought into your lives and the happiness they shared with you in their life. It is our aim to help you achieve that goal and assist you to make the funeral service as comforting as possible.

We consider it a great privilege when we are entrusted with arranging a funeral for a family.
We are very aware of the huge responsibility we have to that family. A funeral is one of the most important, stressful, and emotional experiences a family or individual has to endure so the arrangements must be handled professionally.

Qualified and Regulated

All of our Funeral Directors are fully qualified members of The British Institute of Funeral Directors (BIFD) and hold the Diploma in Funeral Directing. Tim Welch, the current Managing Director, is also a fully qualified Embalmer and member of the British Institute of Embalmers (BIE).

In addition, we are members of the National Association of Funeral Directors (NAFD), giving our clients peace of mind that we operate within the NAFD’s strict Code of Practice Principles, and giving them access to the Funeral Arbitration Scheme (FAS).

Award winning

We have been awarded a Funeral Service Customer Care Award 2013 by Funeral Planning Services. This award was presented following a survey of our clients by Funeral Planning Services, in which we scored 100% Satisfaction from our surveyed clients.

We are always glad to help and give advice. We can guide you through the whole process, using the experience we have gained by arranging over 30,000 funerals over the last 75+ years, but ensuring that you retain control of how the funeral is to be conducted.
Independent funeral directors serving the local communities of Herne Bay, Whitstable, Beltinge, and Canterbury since 1948

Herne Bay Office

94 Station Road, Herne Bay,
CT6 5QB

Tel: 01227 374995

Canterbury Office

Heritage House, 3-4 Burgate,
Canterbury, CT1 2HG

Tel: 01227 787801
A Welch and Sons © 2019-2024. All rights reserved.
Registered UK Company No. 00459014
kc web design