Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend - Putting The Fun Back In Funeral with Special Guest Paul Scheer

Episode Date: November 20, 2025

Conan and special guest Paul Scheer talk to Josh from Bellevue, WA about his direct-to-consumer casket and urn company. Wanna get a chance to talk to Conan? Submit here: teamcoco.com/apply Get access to all the podcasts you love, music channels and radio shows with the SiriusXM App! Get 3 months free using this show link: https://siriusxm.com/conan. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Conan O'Brien needs a fan. Want to talk to Conan? Visit team cocoa.com slash call Conan. Okay, let's get started. Hello. Hi, Josh. Welcome to Conan Needs a Fan with Conan and special guest, Paul Shear. Hey, Josh.

Hey, Josh. And I understand, Josh, you and I have not met, but you and Paul have chatted on the podcast. Is that right? Yeah, I guess so, right? We met, you tied it with David, but I was in the room. So I shook your hand, but you likely won't remember me from all the activity. Well, quick question, Josh, was he cold and dismissive when you shook his hand? Was he like, did he try and big time you?

He looked deep into my eyes. I panicked and I left and I handed it into David. This is the effect I have on people, you know? He did it with me today. So, yes, we have special guest, the very funny Paul Shear, sitting in with us. And he's going to help us help you because what I like to do is meet fans and find out about them and then help them with their issues if they have any. And so, Josh, tell us a little bit about yourself. Yeah, so I live in Bellevue, Washington.

My wife has 17 years. I have three kids. Today I'm in Chicago because I'm here for a national funeral convention because I run a direct-to-consumer casket and earned company. I was going to say, I thought I'm just going to say, I'm glad he's in the funeral business. Because if you were just fan-boying out at the convention, I'd be creeped out. I was going to say, what happens if someone dies are y'all in Chicago right now? I mean, what's going to happen? The best possible place.

But you should attend one funeral convention in your life, I would say. All right. Not two, but one. I disagree. But, you know, we can talk. And let's talk about it. And you can tell me a little bit about the business. What do you do in the funeral business, Josh?

So most families, when they have a loss, they go to their local funeral home. They don't know what things should cost reasonably so. They don't shop around. And they end up spending often too much money. They don't have a good buy they necessarily want. But what these families don't know is there's a federal law called the funeral rule. It's an FTC law that gives you the right to buy your caskets, earns other products outside the funeral home.

And so that's what we do. We sell caskets and earns at roughly half the price that they're sold elsewhere through our own site, through Costco, Sam's Club, Amazon. So we try to help families save a lot of money. I could buy caskets in bulk. I mean, is it, do you know when you go to a, if you go to a Costco or something you can get, not just you get like 35 rolls of toilet paper? Could I go and buy like, yeah, for a family?

Family size. We will sell you hundreds of caskets. It's like the first. fruit loops. That's like the fruit loops that feed 35 kids for a week. Does anyone ever buy more? Does anyone ever buy more than one casket at once, do you think? Just buy a couple? Not at once, but we have families that have needs in their community. And so, but usually they don't fill up their trunk with more than one. I have a question about this because, you know, normally when someone dies, it's, it's, you know, it's a surprise or

we didn't know what's going to happen. And it seems like you can't take this time to like go shopping around. It's not like, oh, hold on. Let me order one on Amazon. And like, when will that come in like a week? Like, I don't know, you know, yeah. Also, a big problem, I've had this with shoes. Oh, this pair of shoes looks really amazing.

You order it from Amazon, they come and they don't fit. If the casket shows up after you've waited for three days and you try and put Uncle Mori in there and he doesn't fit, what do you do? Yeah. Well, he'll fit. We'll make sure he fits. Oh, my God. I don't like the way he says that.

Yes. Josh. Yeah, he solved all these problems. Josh has another product he could sell you called the D-Legger. I told me you you have to come to a funeral convention. It's Monson's D-Legger. Keep the bottom part closed and no one knows where those legs went. Please change the name of your funeral company.

We'll make sure they fit. That's right. Most people fit in a standard size, and then we do have wider ones for those who need them. Yeah. Okay, this is a very obvious area, but when one is in this position, they often start selling you a casket.

This is the normal way. You're at a funeral home. They start ordering you a casket or trying to sell you a casket, and they want to sell you this really beautiful casket. And even if this is someone who is really near and dear to you, there is part of you that's thinking like, it's going immediately in the ground.

Right. Right. No one's getting to look at this thing. No one's getting to look at this thing. So the fact that it has flames painted on the side and it gets AM FM radio. Now, stop attacking my kiss coffin because that is something I hold and I treasure dearly. You know, I've seen the kiss coffin. We had Gene Simmons on the old late night show and he came on with all kiss. He just tried to use my show as an infomercial and he came on with all these, all this kiss stuff. I was actually on that show.

Are you on that show? Yes, because I remember the kiss coffin in the hallway. Yes, it was in the hallway. And I was looking at it, and I kept trying to talk to him about cool backstage stories and being in a rock band. And he's just like, let's just stick to the merchandise. So the coffins you're selling for half price, how can you find that savings? Is it because there's so much upselling that goes on in a normal funeral home?

That's right. Just the dynamics of somebody making a distress purchase. They're only not shopping around is lit to huge markups on these products. But to your point, they all do the same thing. You should not, it's all aesthetics. It's a rectangle. They have the same functionality you should not overspend on these products. And there's not a lot of functionality either.

I mean, it's a box that is out of sight, out of mind. Yeah. I hate to be too graphic about this. I don't mind putting a little string in a bell there just in case. You know, I feel like old school style, just in case, you get, you know, you wake up. You got hit that little. Do you know who wanted that? Who?

George Washington wanted that. His big fear, which was a very common late 18th century fear and early 19th century fear was being buried alive because before they were embalming, it was a real possibility. And so he was very worried that he would be buried prematurely. They didn't do the bell, but he did ask that people keep an eye on him for a couple days

and poke him with sticks. Wait, is that true? Yeah. No, poke him with sticks? No, I maybe made that part up just for fun and now you've ruined it. So Josh, you have this business, and this actually, all kidding aside, it does sound like you're really helping people because many people spend a fortune and sometimes spend money they don't even really have paying all these expenses and they don't realize that there's another way to go. Yeah, we try to be a service business.

We sell products, but at the end of the day, we have a team here who's here to guide somebody through a really difficult period. It's incredibly rewarding to run this business. Can I ask you about something I've considered and tell me if this would even be possible, but I've discussed this with a couple of people. It may even have come up here, but it's the idea that if I pass away, maybe I'm not put in a casket or maybe I'm not cremated. Maybe I could be a body on a crime procedural show. Do you know what I mean?

Like found by a day. jogger. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like a jogger's running by, and then you cut to the cops and they have their coffee. And it's me. I'm there. And whatever, put some jogging clothes on me. I'll clean up all right. Yeah. But it would be a way that I've continued to work in the business. A final performance. Yeah. Or more. Oh, okay. You're saying keep it going. Wow. Well, there are probably chemicals that would keep me going. And a weekend at Bernie's, I think, is a documentary. That's like they know two is. Yeah. But anyway, it's just, or being left in a field, something.

A scarecrow. Yes. I'm kind of scarecrowy now. Crows do not settle on me. You see, that would be amazing. I want to ask Josh about, have you? I think Josh left. Oh, sorry.

No, let's make all this happen. I'm taking notes. Josh, Josh realized that these guys are not. Are not reputable. I should not be talking to them. Is there, I've seen this a few times where they, set up a scene. So it's like somebody, uh, the, the image that I'm thinking of is like a woman sitting at a table with a drink and cards and a pack of cigarettes. I've seen that as like a way

to do a wake. A tableau. Is that, does anyone really do that? I think we've reached the edge of my expert. I've seen a lot of strange things. That is not, I have a picture of it on my phone because I was, I, I, just for fun. And, okay, then that explains it. But I didn't know if this is a new thing. Like creating a tablo. I'm going to back you up. peer, Paul. And this is, and I don't want to. I want to go after you. But I have to because I have also heard of, oh, they've been set up in their Bark Loungeer and they used to watch, you know, love watching their, you know, Seahawks game. And so that's what we set up. And that's how you can go see them. It's like an exhibit in the Smithsonian instead of like a, it's like a wake,

but you're watching them in their, their nice moment. Yeah, well, I think Josh made it clear. He's, he's not going anywhere near this. Yeah, he's checked out. But there's no limit to what we'll do. Part of why I reached out, you're a visionary. No limit. Or we haven't found the limit yet, and we'll get them in there. He's jamming NBA stars into a tiny casket. Let's create options. I want the Wemby coffin, please.

That's right. Are you, at this convention, is there a lot of partying? Is there a lot of partying? Because, you know, I'm going to say this, because Josh is clearly a very funny, fun guy. He's met you before, Paul, and you only meet with people who are fun and funny. I do. And you're listening to our podcast and you're contacting us. So people always have this feeling that the person at the funeral home is, you know, like lurch on the Adams family. And you're not. I'm guessing you guys really like to party when you get together. It's hit and miss.

I would say I've been in other industries where it might be a little more. Yeah, I don't, I don't, like, there are a lot of fantastic people in this business. I wouldn't say it's the most lively crew of any industry out there. It's so funny because I would think being around death all the time would make you want to be more alive. Does that make sense? Oh. I agree with that very much so. I think spending every day answering the call from people around these moments, it really makes you reflect.

I don't know if it makes you go out. party, but it certainly makes me appreciate the day. You're not putting the fun back in funeral. We are putting the fun at funeral. You are. You are. Yeah. It's not on the streets of Chicago. Yeah. He calls them funerals. That's right. That's, again, taking notes. Just try it. Just try it. This is why I came on. I hope you, uh, welcome to this funer roll. Just try it. Maybe we should start a funeral. Funeral sounds nice. Yeah. It's a, yeah, it doesn't seem as dour. Yeah. Okay. Like carnival. We could call funnel cakes, funeral cakes, funeral cakes. just to try and switch it back the other way.

Josh is, he is trying to put the fun back in Funeral, and he actually sent us all gifts. Josh, do you want to explain what these gifts are? Yeah, please. Yeah, so about a year ago, we had a visitor at Titan. His name is Mort, and he is, we're still getting to know him. He's a little coffin plushy, and we think in his prior life, he was a funeral director and has now come back to encourage families to plan.

He's very cuddly. He was the mascot of the Worcester Red Sox this year. Oh, my God. My family's all from Worcester, yes. Oh, you could have seen him this summer. The FAR team is in Worcester. Yeah, he lost the mascot race pretty badly, but he put in a good effort. died out there

yeah exactly and so yeah just a quick question well here's the thing I'm not going to hug a casket I'm sorry coughing you know

it's always been strange to me when you know if you're watching a commercial and it's for a kind of food do you know what I mean like a hamburger and the hamburger comes out

and says, you'll love me. And whenever the animal is saying, please eat me. And Robert Smigel and I once worked on a sketch that we couldn't get on to Saturday Night Live for obvious reasons, but it was a cartoon hot dog and he was saying, convert me into shit. And it was all him,

and it's him begging to be eaten, ingested, and then excreted into a toilet. And because it's insane, it's insane that food would be begging you to enjoy consuming it. This, I'm getting the same vibe here with Cascady, which is, Mort. Mort.

I think Cascady really rolls off the tongue. Mort Cascady. Yeah, exactly. But he's so happy. He's someone who you think was a funeral director, died, and is enjoying the experience of being dead so much that he's come back to convince other people to die. I want you inside of me. Yeah.

To plan their funerals, not to die. To plan their funeral. Oh, to plan their funeral. Yes, not to pass. Does he profit? He wants you to live. He wants you to live, but he's here to remind you that you've only got so much time left. Yes.

Mort. Now, let me ask you. This is a question I have to ask. Who's selling Mort? Who benefits through sales of Mort? I mean, we sell Mort. I would say we've given more mortes away than we sell him, but he is for sale on her. Our site.

He is here to help, though. Do you sell urns as well as caskets? Oh, definitely. And what are people looking for in an urn? Because an urn is a much, I mean, first of all, technically you don't need an urn. Everyone's got jars at home. That's right. Yeah, for it.

Again. You just got to label them. It's like yogurt in the fridge. You've got to label it. Exactly. Well, I made the mistake I put it in my spice drawer. Oh, no, really. This ham tastes fantastic.

Everything is aesthetics. What we tell families is to close your eyes and envision the look that you love for your loved one, and we'll have an option for you in that color, that style, and it will be affordable. Oh, wow. And so it's really just, are you going to place it in your home? Are you going to scatter in a place that's meaningful to you? Are you going to, you can bury and earn and have a place to visit? But why would you bury and earn, though?

Like, it feels like... People do it. I know that it's quite common. People often bury an urn. First of all, you don't have to get a big plot. Okay. And it gives you, and you'll probably know the term for this, Josh, but people want a destination. They want to go visit this person.

First of all, we all know they do that for about a year or two. And then they drift away, and the grave goes untended. But... That bell just ringing. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Ding, ding, ding. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. I just shout down into the earth.

You in the ringing. Lay off the bell. We'll get to you. I'm busy. Wow. Josh, I blame you for this whole segment. Yeah. You did this.

I've taken us to a dark place. Bring us back. But you know what? You have, I have to say this, Josh, you have a very kind, face and you seem very serene. And I think you have the kind of mean, the kind of, you know, aura that someone should have who's in this business, which is he, you know, doesn't he? Yeah, you do. You seem like you're very sympathetic. You have a lot of empathy. Yeah, you've got really kind eyes. And if, when Conan dies, I'll call, I'll call Josh. Well, but also, I was really short casket.

really short. Yeah. I want my legs, I want holes and my legs coming out the, and then I want, yeah,

and then I want them to curl up like the wicked witch. I want them to go out and in, out and in and pulse, like with the pulsing music. Have pulsing music

playing and my legs are going, blan, brim, it's diplo. This is your official funeral plan. Yeah,

unless you have it rid down elsewhere, this podcast, will serve that I want Josh to handle it all. He'll get me in there. He'll cram me in. Perfect. One way or another.

You'll feel. I want, I want nothing to do with Mort. Mort's, uh, why is Mort wearing a bow tie? Who made that? He's a funeral director. He's very, he's a, this is a profession that people wear a suit. He stole it off a dead body. Oh, Mort.

Yeah. Please, let's not bring up grave robbing. I think that's taboo. I don't know, Josh. You've got me thinking about a lot of stuff right now. There's a lot to consider here. I do think we are a society that is largely removed all thinking about death. It's been removed from, you know, advertising has scrubbed away elderly. It's not discussed. Right. So this is important. This podcast is a way for people to really think about the dead. death and what preparations they want to make. And that leads me to my next question. Have you ever suspected someone of murder because they came in and started asking about caskets

before the person died? I remember one person asked me about buying caskets in bulk. And that's my crime suspect. Oh, well, I sympathize with this fellow. He must have many people he's angry with. I love a guy who's really worried about it. I want to kill them all, but I've got to take care of their arrangements. By the way, I like this is like an hour-long procedural.

The funeral director who solves murders, like he's like, I know it was foul play. Oh, that's right. Yeah, people, that's a good procedural. That would be great. If this becomes a show, Josh, you participate in the prophets. Yeah, a funeral director who just something's off. He's really good at being a funeral director, but bodies come in. They say it's natural causes, but this is very suspicious.

But he's not a forensic scientist. He's not, yeah, he's just a funeral director. He's like, like a murder she wrote. It's like that. It's just like a small town. People are dying unexpectedly. Yeah. And I think what happens is when the body comes in and it's got a large harpoon through it.

And other people are saying it's a heart attack. This person's like, I just don't know. And they have that Colombo thing of their, they're very nice and they're just asking questions, but clearly that's their way of getting the truth. And then at the end, they go, yeah, yeah, we knew it was murder. We just didn't tell you, you're just doing the funeral directing. So, yeah, you didn't need to know that. Yeah, oh, okay, well, I'm sure, yeah.

The police, no, the police said, did you hear that? It was in the paper three weeks ago and they caught the guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was a murder. He had a harpooned through his chest. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So why are you acting like this is a show? It's not a show, you asshole. All right, Josh.

We, uh, Josh, do you have a question for Conan before we go? We may have answered it with all my funeral babble. Absolutely. Absolutely. As a funeral visionary, Conan, if we designed the perfect casket for you, what would that look like? Because we would love to do that. My casket? You know, I went to Ghana, where the people and the people of Ghana are brilliant at making custom caskets. It's a tradition they've had for a long time. And, I mean, beautiful woodworking where they'll make, if the person was really into a certain kind of beer, the casket will be a giant, you know, six-foot beer bottle that's beautifully rendered. And so they asked me, it's an episode of Conan O'Brien must go. Or no, I think Conan Without Borders, also available in the same streaming service, HBO Max.

But anyway, I go. You can see me go to Ghana, and they ask me about my casket, and I say that I want to be able to watch myself for all eternity. And they built me a casket with a TV that faces in. and I get in it and they close it and I can watch on a loop my shows from, you know, the 90s and 2000s and stuff on a steady stream.

And the shape is you. Yes, the shape. It's a giant you. And it's, oh, I forgot. I buried the lead. Hello, homerun. But I get inside me. And we can post this photo along with,

Blay, what's the lingo here? Just a little, Team Coco, podcast. on Instagram. Yeah. And then we'll post the photo of my casket and I brought it back.

We have it here somewhere. Yeah. We really do. We have it in storage. So, sir, no sale. I'm all taking care of. I tied up all your time and I already own my casket.

It's okay. I was stealing all the ideas we talked about and the gravestones with TV. We're going to get in touch with you about this TV show because I think Paul has got a winner here. And I love the idea that the police already had it solved every week, every week. Every week. What are you talking about? Just do your job and shut up. Hey, Josh, thank you so much.

Really nice talking to you. You too, Conan. Can I say one nice thing before we go? If it's nice, of course. I feel like this was a little bit. But when I was, humor was really important in my family growing up. And there was nothing more thrilling to me than when I saw my dad laughing at something that I like. and that was often the Simpsons when you were there. Oh, thank you. I have kids, and we listen to your podcast and watch You Must Go and Without Borders, and I see my kids watching me laugh at your show,

and I just think that you've, no one's made me laugh more in my life than you, and this is the generational impact you've had. Hey, Josh, that means a world to me. Thank you. I'm ecstatic that that's true, and I will tell you, I lost both my parents last,

December, one of the things I think about a lot is that I would watch TV with my dad and I would clock what he laughed at. And he really loved Johnny Carson when he would do Karnak. So I had this very strong memory of watching my dad, watching this very silly man in a giant hat doing really funny jokes on a late night show. And that was imprinted on my DNA. I know it was. And so, So I get what you're saying, and I'm thrilled that that's true, and we're going to just keep trying to make more idiocy for you and your children. And you know what? Screw it. I'm getting, I'm selling the Ghana casket.

And I'm going with Josh now. Okay, Josh, I'll be up there. I'll come up there and we'll pick up something amazing. And I'm going to spend, spend, spend. I want to be buried in a Bugatti that's running. And you have to keep refueling it at the cemetery. I'm coming, Josh. Thank you, Josh.

Take care. Thank you so much. Great to meet you. Conan O'Brien needs a fan. With Conan O'Brien, Sonam of Sessian, and Matt Gourley. Produced by me, Matt Gourley. Executive produced by Adam Sacks, Jeff Ross, and Nick Liao. Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino.

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