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A more beautiful resting place
Continue the cycle of life when your ashes are mixed with soil and returned to the base of your tree.
A personal memorial ceremony
Your forest steward will help shape a memorial ceremony that reflects your unique personality.
A legacy of protected landscapes
Your memorial helps conserve open spaces and reforest America.
What is the Memorial Trees for Heroes program?
Their “Memorial Trees for Heroes” initiative gives frontline heroes a serene resting place, a personalized memorial service and a legacy of conservation. The company is first offering memorial trees from its protected coastal Mendocino County forest, where families of fallen frontline workers across the country may enroll to reserve a tree. The Memorial Trees for Heroes initiative provides up to $1 million worth of memorial trees to healthcare providers, caregivers and first responder professionals who gave their lives in the fight against COVID-19 at no cost.
The offer aims to give frontline heroes the legacy reflective of the brave sacrifice they’ve made and to help provide some solace for grieving families and loved ones. Funeral and memorial planning can be an incredibly stressful and expensive endeavor. The average traditional burial costs around $8,755, and we hope to ease the burden and cost of planning a memorial for your hero.
It’s our small way of saying thank you for your hero’s incredible service to our country.
What is Better Place Forests?
Better Place Forests offers private memorial trees in a protected conservation memorial forest. Ashes are mixed with soil and returned to the base of the tree during a personalized memorial ceremony, where a customized bronze memorial marker is placed. To learn more about the process, click here. Memorial trees offer frontline heroes a peaceful resting place, a personalized memorial service and a legacy of conservation.
For a limited time, you can schedule a free online tour to guarantee a spot in our forest along the Rock River.
Our serene coastal California forest features stunning views of the Pacific Ocean.
Point Arena, California
Where are the memorial trees located?
We’ll begin by offering trees to frontline heroes in our coastal California forest in Mendocino county.
To serve areas most impacted by COVID-19, we are seeking to expand to heavily impacted states like New York.
We want to help covid19 impacted areas
FAQs
Can I apply if I don’t live in California?
Yes the Memorial Trees for Heroes is for healthcare providers, caregivers, and first response professionals across America.
The timeline for memorial services in Point Arena is subject to shelter-in-place guidelines for the State of California, Mendocino County, and Better Place Forests. As soon as we are able, we will open the forest to visitors and begin scheduling Memorial Ceremonies. We are happy to begin the planning process with you in advance of opening the forest.
When will a ceremony take place?
Better Place Forests purchases beautiful forest land and conserves it for future generations. We offer private memorial trees in a protected memorial conservation forest. Ashes are mixed with soil and returned to the base of the tree during a personalized memorial ceremony. A customized bronze memorial marker is placed at the tree marking the location.
How does Better Place Forests work?
We would be happy to put you in touch with an Advisor who can tell you more about purchasing a memorial tree.
What if I don’t qualify but am interested in a memorial tree with Better Place Forests?
We are reviewing applications as quickly as possible and will aim to reach out to you within 48 hours of your submission. For those who qualify, we’ll answer any questions you have and discuss the details of selecting a memorial tree for your hero.
When and how will I be contacted?
We will need a death certificate and verification of your hero’s occupation and place of employment. The customer care team will review documentation requirements with you in detail on their call.
What documentation do you require?
When you come to this forest you leave here feeling better. You leave here feeling healed and nurtured and hopeful.
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If you have land you would like to dedicate to the program, we’d love to be in touch. Fill out this form and a member of our real estate team will reach out.
Do you own forestland you’d like to dedicate to frontline heroes?
A more meaningful and affordable resting place
“Not only is a traditional service roughly twice the cost, but you’re very limited on what you get out of it.”
Hear more about why Spencer chose Better Place Forests for his late wife, Sheila, in the video below.
Interested in learning more about how a memorial forest works?
A final resting place worth talking about
Our customers choose Better Place Forests for deeply personal reasons: our stunning locations, a more personal memorial option or a beautiful place for loved ones to reflect. Many also comment on our caring team that is there every step of the way. Hear more straight from our customers.
Learn more about our Rock River forest by taking a free, guided online forest tour
See why thousands of people have chosen trees, not tombstones
Better Place Forests offers a natural alternative to cemeteries. Your ashes are placed beneath a private tree in a peaceful forest where your loved ones can visit and remember you.
Call us anytime at 877-830-8311
Leave the earth, better
A natural alternative to cemeteries in northern Illinois on the banks of the peaceful Rock River.
Bringing Better Place Forests to the central Midwest
Better Place Forests Rock River is a lush 60-acre forest in northern Illinois. Conveniently located for residents in the central Midwest, it’s only two hours from Chicago, Milwaukee, and Madison.
This flourishing forest features Midwestern woodland tranquility, a richly diverse ecosystem, and a captivating viewshed position above the Rock River, a tributary of the Mississippi River. Choose from a variety of beloved native tree species, including red and white oak, black walnut, hackberry, black cherry, and shagbark hickory.
We couldn’t be more excited to help preserve this iconic slice of the Midwest and offer families a peaceful sanctuary to reflect and remember their loved ones.
The news is spreading
“The expansion protect[s] sixty acres of forestland [and] provides local families who choose cremation the option to lay their loved ones to rest under a private, permanently protected tree.”
“Rick Ryland, who was a caretaker on the land for 14 years, said...‘Knowing that Better Place Forests will conserve the land and help more people connect with the natural beauty of this unique forest makes me incredibly happy.’”
“As opposed to going to a cemetery and going back each year to grieve the loss of a loved one…going to a forest and being in that peaceful place, I think that’s a great idea.”
“It’s good for the environment, the location is more beautiful than a traditional graveyard, and it’s cheaper as well.”
Originally aired 3/15/21
