Lena Park opened Marker in 2016, in a single-room office on the second floor of an old print shop at Western and Bell. She had spent the previous twelve years inside corporate funeral homes — first as a director's apprentice, then as a director, then as a senior manager who watched the firm absorb four smaller homes and start running the same upsell scripts in each of them.
By the time she left, she had had the same conversation with several hundred grieving families. They wanted simpler. They wanted shorter. They wanted to spend less. They did not want to be sold things. They wanted a single number on a single page, and they wanted to know what it included.
Marker is the firm she would have wanted to call.
What we believe
The funeral profession serves families at the worst moment of their lives. The defining act of that service is honesty — about what the family needs, what they don't, and what it will cost. We have built every part of this firm around that one principle.
We publish every price on a single page. We do not run upsell scripts. We do not pay our directors on commission. We do not partner with any casket vendor, any flower vendor, or any cemetery. Our crematory partner is a single facility in Tukwila that we have used since 2016; we have toured it, audited their procedures, and would invite any family to see it for themselves.
Who we are
Lena Park is the founder and director. She is licensed by the State of Washington (license #FD-3284), holds a Master of Business Administration from the University of Washington, and was previously a senior funeral director at the Pacific Northwest's largest funeral chain. She lives in Madrona with her partner and two dogs.
Marcus Reyes is the operations director, licensed (FD-4012). He joined Marker in 2019 from a third-generation family firm in Ballard. He handles permits, paperwork, and the cremation logistics.
Amelia Tran is the family coordinator. She is not licensed as a funeral director — she is, by training, a hospice social worker. Her job is to be the person you talk to first. She joined Marker in 2021.
That is the entire firm. Three people. We answer the phone ourselves; we run the services ourselves; we close out the paperwork ourselves.