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How a Funeral Museum Used Podcasting to Escape the “Weird” Bucket · Your Mic

• 0:00
  Talking about the power of niche podcasting is easy. After all, don't they say talk is cheap? Proving it, however, is harder. So today I want to talk about one of Speak Podcasting's longest running clients. A museum that used to get lumped in with the Beer Can Museum and now stands shoulder to shoulder with the best museums in the country. And how a podcast helped them step out of the weird bucket and into their own lane.
• 0:30
  Welcome back to Your Mic. My name is Freddy Cruz. And this is the story of the National Museum of Funeral History. With my friend Genevieve Keeney-Vasquez, she's the president and CEO of the museum. When she started working at the museum, it wasn't really seen as such. It was seen as one of those weird places, an oddity, a quirky spot.
• 0:55
  macabre. The thing you put in a strange things to do in Houston list between a beer can collection and a two-headed animal. She told me about a free ad they got in a Houston visitor guide once, and it listed them right next to the beer can museum. Keeping us in that oddity, aren't you? That was her line. She knew that wasn't who they were.
• 1:20
  You see, in her mind and in reality, they were on par, they are on par with the biggest institutions, the Fine Arts Museum, the Museum of Natural Science, a serious educational institution dedicated to one of the oldest professions in human history, caring for the dead.
• 1:40
  But without a PR budget, it didn't really matter what she knew. When she started, her words, they didn't even have a line item for marketing. They were at the mercy of whoever happened to walk in, write about them, and how that person decided to frame it. One day, she went to a grocery store less than a quarter mile away from the museum wearing a shirt with the museum's name on it. A woman looked at the shirt and asked, where's that?
• 2:09
  Genevieve said, are you kidding me? I'm legit down the street. There's a sign on the road pointing the way. Her own neighborhood didn't even know the museum existed. And that is when she realized if they didn't tell their own story, no one else was going to get it right.
• 2:24
  So when they started talking about podcasting, it wasn't about jumping onto a trend. It was about control, controlling the narrative, controlling the tone, controlling how the museum talked about death, funerals, grief, culture, and history without waiting for a reporter, a blogger, or some random Yelper to get it, or somebody that was going to say, oh, what a weird place. And that matters when your topic is something most people think.
• 2:52
  would prefer to avoid because here's the other thing about the national museum of funeral history they are painfully aware that we are a death denying society genevieve says it she said it more than once we'll watch crime shows until three in the morning we'll binge documentaries about serial killers if it bleeds it leads you know the cliche about news right we accept it
• 3:16
  But when the conversation shifts from fictional bodies or strangers on the news to our own mortality, things get strange. We avoid it. We keep death at arm's length until it gets close.
• 3:32
  Then we panic. She calls it death denial and she sees it everywhere, especially here in the West. So now imagine trying to run a museum about funerals in that environment. If people already don't want to talk about death and the only thing they ever see about you is a headline that puts you next to a freaking beer can museum. What are the odds they walk in? That's the backdrop. And here's what the podcast did.
• 4:00
  At first, Genevieve approached the show like most people do as an extension of the exhibits. If they had a display about coins, she'd bring on somebody like her dad to talk about the coins in the money casket. Niche topics for a niche museum, and it worked. Then something shifted. People started listening to the show and realizing that their own niche, whatever they did in the world, connected to what the museum represented. They saw themselves...
• 4:27
  In the mission, they saw that this wasn't just a show for funeral directors only or for people who collect caskets the way other people collect stamps. It was a show about how we live, how we remember, and how we honor the people we lose. And so they started reaching out. And now instead of chasing guests, Genevieve has guests coming to her. And that's the power of a niche podcast. When it's done right, you start speaking to the smallest circle.
• 4:56
  The people who care enough to walk into a funeral museum on purpose. You keep going. You tell real stories. You educate. You lean into the taboo.
• 5:07
  Instead of away from it. And eventually the circle gets bigger. The other piece of this I love. Is what Genevieve said about being a guest. Before becoming a host. We met years ago. When she came on to my Sunday morning radio show. Same with Dorothy from the Rose. We've talked about this. I have a theory. And talking to Genevieve pretty much confirmed it. That great guests make great hosts.
• 5:30
  Because when you have sat on the other side of the mic, you understand what the host is trying to pull out of you. You understand pacing, vulnerability, how it feels when somebody throws you a lifeline question. She said every host should be a guest a few times, and she's right. Oh, yeah. I call it empathy training. And in a field like hers, empathy is everything.
• 5:55
  everything. She's a funeral director who was death curious since she was seven, a former palliative care nurse who spent over 20 years with veterans at the end of life. She has the kind of stories most of us would never encounter on our own. The podcast gives her a place to put those stories where they can actually do some good. So what does this mean for you?
• 6:18
  Okay, so maybe you're not in the funeral business. Maybe your thing is software or law or dentistry or whatever the heck you're trying to do that you've convinced yourself is too niche or too weird or too boring for a show. Here's what the National Museum of Funeral History proves.
• 6:36
  You're not too niche. You're not too weird. You're not an oddity. You're not boring. You are only as boring as the stories you're willing to tell. A niche podcast lets you talk directly to the people who care without watering yourself down for the people who never will. Reframe how the world sees you instead of waiting for somebody else to categorize you correctly. Turn oddity into institution over time.
• 7:05
  one episode at a time. If a museum dedicated to funerals can use a podcast to fight death denial, educate the public, and shift their brand from macabre curiosity to legit cultural landmark...
• 7:20
  What can it do with yours? My name is Freddy Cruz and this is your mic. If this episode made you rethink what niche means, listen to Genevieve's story in your feed. I'll link it in the show notes and then ask yourself if you still believe your topic is too small because I guarantee you, it's not. Thanks so much for listening.