Dignity Memorial® Network to Honor Organ and Tissue Donor Families as Sponsor of 2010 Donate Life Rose Parade® Float

LOS ANGELES – (June 1, 2009) – The Dignity Memorial® network, North America’s largest network of funeral, cremation and cemetery service providers, will honor four organ and tissue donor families as a top-tier sponsor of the 2010 Donate Life Rose Parade float.

The seventh annual Donate Life Rose Parade float will dramatize the remarkable difference that organ and tissue donation makes to those in need of transplants. In this spirit, the Dignity Memorial network will honor four donors who made a difference by saving and healing lives in their passing. Their legacies will be memorialized with four floragraphs – portraits made of floral and natural materials – to be decorated by each donor’s family and featured on the Donate Life float entry in the 121st Rose Parade on Jan. 1, 2010.

“Every day, Dignity Memorial providers across the country help families create memorial services that, like the people they honor, will be long remembered,” said Phil Jacobs, spokesperson for the Dignity Memorial provider network. “Our employees experience firsthand not only the grief and heartache families face when their loved ones pass away, but also the pride many of them take in knowing their loved ones saved and healed lives as organ and tissue donors. Through our support of the Donate Life Rose Parade float, we remember those who have so generously gifted others with renewed life.”

The Donate Life float is part of a national campaign to inspire people to save and heal lives by registering in their states to be organ, eye and tissue donors. The Dignity Memorial network is joined by more than 60 official partners from across the nation, including organ and tissue recovery organizations, tissue banks, state donor registries, transplant centers and affiliated organizations, whose commitments support the float and its lifesaving mission.

“We salute the Dignity Memorial network’s commitment to honoring donor families in such a respectful and meaningful way,” said Bryan Stewart, vice president of communications at OneLegacy, the non-profit organ and tissue recovery organization serving the greater Los Angeles, which coordinates the national Donate Life Rose Parade float campaign. “The donor families selected will be profoundly touched as they bring their loved ones’ images to life for all the world to see.”

The Dignity Memorial network of more than 1,600 funeral, cremation and cemetery service providers is North America’s most trusted resource for funeral and memorialization services. Dignity Memorial providers offer an unmatched combination of products and locations serving families with care, integrity, respect and service excellence.