Writing Obituaries That Actually Work At Woods Mortuary
I spent about eight years working with Woods Mortuary on the editorial side of obituary submissions. The work isn't glamorous, but it's important because you're essentially helping families memorialize someone while navigating a system that doesn't always make things easy. Let me tell you how it actually goes down. The core process is straightforward: someone dies, the family needs an obituary written, and Woods Mortuary publishes it either in their own materials or in partnership with local newspapers like the Atlanta Journal-Constitution or AJC.com. What most people don't realize is that there's a significant gap between what a grieving family wants to write and what actually gets published without edits, resubmissions, or delays. I've seen families bring in twenty-page manuscripts that needed to be compressed into 200 words. The trick isn't cutting for the sake of cutting — it's identifying what matters and what's filler. "Beloved husband, father, grandfather, great-grandfather, friend, mentor, and community pillar" is not twenty different things. It's one thing: this person was important to a lot of people. You say that once, cleanly, and move on.
The submission workflow at Woods Mortuary typically runs through their intake team, which reviews each obituary for completeness before it goes to typesetting. They check for surviving family members listed correctly, service details that are accurate, and any special requests about where donations should go. A single typo in a service time can mean the difference between people showing up and people missing the visitation.
The Practical Steps
Start by gathering the facts before you write a single sentence of prose. Full legal name, date of birth, date of death, city of residence at time of death, name of the employer or the nature of the work if that's relevant, and the list of immediate surviving family — spouse, children, grandchildren, and so on. Also collect the names of those who predeceased the person, because families usually want that included. Then ask the family what tone they want. Some want something formal and traditional. Others want humor or personal anecdotes. Woods Mortuary can accommodate a range of styles, but they need you to tell them upfront what you're going for. I've had to resubmit obituaries twice because the family said one thing over the phone and then another in writing. Draft the piece with the facts first, then layer in the personal content. Keep the total word count in mind — most newspaper placements run between 150 and 400 words depending on the space purchased. Woods Mortuary's own digital platform is more flexible, but even there, readability drops off after about 500 words. Nobody clicks through eight paragraphs of dense text about someone's life.
Get the Full Details
Service information belongs at the end. Visitation time and location, funeral or memorial service details, burial information if applicable, and the charity for Memorial Donations In Lieu Of Flowers. Double-check every time. I learned this the hard way during a particularly rough week when three separate obituaries had incorrect service times, and we had to issue corrections the same day. It sounds small but it causes real distress for families who are already dealing with everything else.
Common Mistakes And How To Avoid Them
The biggest error I see is incomplete survivor lists. Someone will write "survived by his loving family" and leave it at that. That's not sufficient for publication. You need the actual names, or at minimum the relationships spelled out so the editor can format it properly. If a child has passed away, that should be noted with the person's name and year of death. Omitting that detail can come across as unintentional erasure, and families sometimes notice it later and come back to you about it. Another issue is mixing biographical detail with service logistics in a way that makes the piece hard to scan. Readers of obituaries are typically looking for two things: did I know this person and what do I need to know about the service? Put those things in separate sections. A short paragraph about the person's life, then a clean block of service details. That structure works every time. Tone inconsistency is a subtler problem. One paragraph might be deeply serious and the next includes a joke that doesn't land. If the family wants humor, commit to it throughout or keep it contained. A single lighthearted line in an otherwise formal piece reads as careless rather than charming.
A Real Problem I Faced And What I Did
There was a case where the family provided a photo that was technically a selfie taken at a family reunion about ten years before the person died. The resolution was poor, the lighting was bad, and it didn't look like a standard obituary portrait. Woods Mortuary's submission guidelines require a "clear, recent photograph" but didn't explicitly address old low-quality images. The online publishing system would accept the file, but it rendered poorly on the print version and looked unprofessional. My workaround was to suggest the family reach out to siblings or adult children who might have better quality photos from earlier in the person's life. I also recommended scanning a physical print at 600 DPI minimum if they only had hard copies. That family ended up finding a wedding photo from 1972 that looked great, and it ended up being a better tribute than the blurry selfie ever would have been. Sometimes the oldest photos are the best ones.
What The System Does Wrong
The biggest bottleneck in the current process is the review cycle. Most families submit their obituary on a Tuesday or Wednesday after a death that occurred over the weekend, and the editors are managing dozens of submissions simultaneously. Turnaround can take 24 to 48 hours for the first draft review, and any changes requested by the family add another cycle. During peak periods, like around holidays or major weather events that cause clusters of deaths, the delay can stretch longer. Another limitation is that Woods Mortuary, like most funeral homes, doesn't have a dedicated copy editor on staff. The intake coordinator handles the initial review, and then it goes to the newspaper or digital partner for a second pass. That means errors can slip through both layers, and the correction process requires the family to notice and report it. There's no formal proofreading step beyond basic fact-checking. The paywall situation on AJC.com is also worth noting. Obituaries are free to read on Woods Mortuary's own site, but the AJC pushes some content behind a subscription. This means not everyone who would normally see the obituary can access it, and families sometimes express frustration about that. It's a business reality of newspaper partnerships, but it does limit reach.
If you're working with limited budget, consider whether you need both the print newspaper placement and the digital version. A well-written digital-only obituary shared through social media and email can reach just as many people as a print listing, often more. The print version still matters for older readers and for people who prefer the traditional format, but it's not essential for everyone.
What Matters Most
At the end of the day, an obituary isn't a literary project. It's a functional document that serves two purposes: it announces a death with the details people need, and it captures something true about who that person was. The best obituaries I've worked on at Woods Mortuary are the ones where the family sat down and talked honestly about the person rather than trying to present a polished version. The quirks, the specific memories, the little details that only people who knew them would include — that's what makes these pieces endure. When you're helping someone write one, slow down. Ask questions. Listen to what they say and what they leave out. The gaps often tell you as much as the words do.
