Arrange a funeral
- How we help
  
  More
  Before the funeral
  Meet with us and we’ll help you plan your loved one’s funeral.
  
  More
  Caskets and urns
  Choose from our wide range of caskets and urns, including eco options.
  
  More
  Personalising your service
  Discover the many ways we can help you personalise a funeral.
  
  More
  Grief counselling
  Access counselling services to help you manage your grief.
  
  More
  Funeral finance
  See how we can help make your loved one’s funeral affordable.
  
  More
  Repatriation
  Bring your loved one home, or send them home, with our repatriation services.
Future planning
About
Obituaries
Our locations
Contact us
Home

Personalising your service

Home / Arrange a funeral / How we help / Personalising your service

Create a fitting farewell for your loved one that honours their individuality

There are many ways to personalise your loved one’s funeral service, from choosing who to lead it through to your choice of music. We can guide you through all the options to create a funeral that’s as unique as your loved one.

Personalising your service Choosing who to lead

Choosing who to lead the service

If your loved one was religious, choosing a minister to lead their funeral service makes sense – especially if the minister was known to them, or they had a personal connection to their local church. You can also choose a celebrant, who can include religious elements in the service, like prayers and readings. Or they can ensure the service is wholly non-religious. We have a range of celebrants we recommend, if needed. For a personal touch, you can even ask family or friends to lead the service.

Options to consider for the service

Flowers

Flowers are a beautiful way to show affection. We can help coordinate bouquets or other floral arrangements, or you can use your own florist.

Music

Honour your loved one through the music of your – or their – choice. We can even arrange live music by organists or pipers.

Catering

If you’d like to have refreshments after the funeral service, we can organise this for you through our experienced in-house caterers, Gattings.

Service sheets

Printed service sheets include details such as hymns, readings, tributes and messages of thanks and help to create a lovely, personal service.

Capturing shared memories

Photos and video

Recording the service

Live streaming

Photos and video

A beautiful part of a funeral is hearing and seeing a wonderful range of memories about your loved one. We encourage you and your family and friends to include photos and video of your loved one in the service – we can help you put together multi-media presentations that celebrate your loved one’s life.

Recording the service

If family and friends can’t attend the service or you’d like to keep a permanent record of it, you can now record your loved one’s funeral. We can arrange a professional recording company to capture all the memories and stories that people share about your loved one.

Live streaming

Sometimes, people can’t attend a funeral, especially if they’re based overseas. For absent family and friends, we can webcast the funeral on the internet, so they can see it happening. This is available at our three chapels in Mt Eden, Henderson and Pakuranga. We can also bring in a company to do live streaming at any of our other funeral homes.

Make a beautiful final journey

Our fleet includes two custom-built Cadillac Premier hearses, which were first used at Sir Edmund Hillary’s state funeral. These state-of-the-art vehicles were built in America by Eagle Coach Company who are known for building the highest quality hearses in the industry.

Rounding out our fleet is a classic 1964 Cadillac, a 1969 Cadillac, a Ford Falcon and a Mercedes Benz hearse.

We’re looking forward to welcoming a 1946 Hudson to our fleet soon.

Davis 0 - Bertha

1/4

Davis 0 - Bertha

Our 1964 classic Cadillac hearse is a truly beautiful vehicle. With its whitewall tires, tail fins and leather interior it really emulates, class, tradition, and quality.

Davis 1

1/5

Davis 1

One of our three, modern Cadillac hearses. Davis 1 is a beautiful example of what a high-quality hearse should look like.

Davis 2

1/7

Davis 2

The second in our fleet of modern Cadillac hearses, Davis 2 has subtle differences from our other modern Cadillac hearses Davis 1 and Davis 2, with the main difference being in the type of mag wheels that have been fitted to the vehicle.

Davis 3

1/6

Davis 3

One of our three, modern Cadillac Hearses. This hearse was first used in Sir Edmund Hillary’s state funeral. This is the hearse will always be special to us at Davis for this reason.

Davis 8

1/6

Davis 8

German innovation has rarely looked this good. Davis 8 is a beautiful Mercedes hearse, fondly referred to as The Shark for its swooping lines. The large windows at the rear allow for great visibility of the casket. This is your newest and most modern vehicle currently in our fleet.

Pure silver fingerprint jewellery

Fingerprint jewellery is a very personalised way of creating a keepsake of your loved one, a truly special piece for you to treasure forever.

We partner with the experienced team at Fingerprints, who will come on site to press their finger directly into the silver. This becomes your actual pendant, capturing not only the fingerprint, but the shape and indentation that is unique to your loved one. With several shapes available, they can work with you to customise items such as pendants, key rings, cufflinks and more.

Learn more at fingerprints.co.nz

Handcrafted memorial books

A memorial book is a beautiful and permanent memento of your loved one’s life. Provide us with some photos, tributes, obituary notices or any other details you’d like included, and we’ll turn it in a high quality personalised book. Handcrafted and beautifully presented, it represents a lasting record of family and friends that attended the funeral.

We're with you every step of the way

Ask us a question Request a call back

Alison Morgan

West Auckland

"I just wanted to say again how much I appreciated your care of Bob and the family at the funeral on Friday. Martin, your care and the way you dealt with us was appreciated. "

Paul Holmes

Mt Eden

"At times of grief it's reassuring to have a great company looking after you, and we really appreciate Davis and in particular your invaluable help Shane – thanks ! "

Ange Foote

"Thanks again Dani for your wonderful support, understanding and efficiency in making it a special send off for dad. "

Ange Foote

"Highly recommend you all, lovely Abigail at reception made me laugh when I needed it after seeing dad for the last time. Dad and I loved to laugh! and mum. Thank you all. "

Lynne Robertson

"Thank you to everyone at Davis Funerals. Wayne’s service was amazing, we had 300 people in the Panmure Yacht Club. So many people commented on the ashes in the scatter tubes and the service sheets."

Sandra Chapman-Smith

"Rachel, I'm so very grateful we found you to organise mum's funeral. You were just perfect. It certainly helps to have someone like you at a time like this. You were made for this job."

Liz Fong

"Thank you for the amazing people you have working at Davis Funeral parlour. I'm so grateful for everything that was done for Keith. I would recommend Davis Funeral parlour to all my Whanau and friends"