But how did it all begin? Our Chief Executive, Jonathan Davies founded MuchLoved in memory of his brother, Philip. Here he explains how the charity began, and why it matters for so many.
MuchLoved Chief Executive Jonathan Davies
‘My brother’s death at the age of 21 was sudden, unexpected, and an overwhelming shock.
Philip was three years younger than me, and the youngest of four siblings. We went to the same school, did the same things. He loved his fish tank, and his BMX bike, he was more of a cheeky chappy than me.
Phil had a healthy enthusiasm for life, an intelligent mind, and a warm nature. In 1995, when he was in his final year at university, he died as a result of taking drugs.
Jonathan's brother Philip
For a long time afterwards, there was plenty of darkness in my life. I felt this sense of dread, a feeling of exhaustion and sickness to the core. I had to keep on going when I just wanted to scream. That feeling lasted for months, and to some degree for years.
I didn’t like the fact that everything was supposed to go back to normal so quickly after the funeral. I knew it was going to take me a long time.
I was keen to create an online memorial to Phil, a legacy that could show many of his happy years and make it easy for his school and university friends, in particular, to view, make contact and maybe add pictures and thoughts of their own. I did some research but couldn’t find an appropriate service available. That’s when I first had the idea for MuchLoved.
Just three years later my mother died. After Phil’s death I saw the joy drain from her eyes and it never really came back again. She was totally devastated and after being diagnosed with bowel cancer died a year later at the age of 55. Her death made me more determined than ever to make MuchLoved happen. I wanted to help others with their grief and registered the domain name, muchloved.com, but I was in no state to put it together as I was in such a difficult place emotionally.
By 2004 my energy was back and I could see by the way the internet was developing that the idea would work. With incredible help from others, particularly university friend Andy Daniels, MuchLoved launched in 2006 and a year later it became a registered charity.
MuchLoved took off gradually. In those early days, people were so grateful, they were telling us how much it had helped them. We were growing, and I was desperately trying to build the organisation, improve the service and promote it to the funeral and charity industries. We started to receive feedback from users that they would like to use their tribute sites as a way of recording donations made in memory.
It's now 15 years since we registered the charity and MuchLoved has transformed. There has been a massive increase in usage and in donations. There are now 160 new tribute websites being created and over 50,000 website visitors every day.
It’s fantastic to help in memory fundraising for charities, particularly at a time when they really need donations.
At the start there was just me and my university friend, volunteering and getting help from others where we could. Now we have a fantastic team that is 20-strong, and they’re working together to create something that’s making a massive difference to so many people.
MuchLoved enables people to create a personalised, and free online tribute site in memory of their loved one where they can share memories, thoughts and stories with families and friends as well as light candles, add music, photos and videos. They can also collect fundraising donations for a special charity or project in their name, organise events, and celebrate anniversaries.
We work in partnership with hundreds of charities and nearly 2,000 funeral director branches. So many funeral directors love it. It provides their families with an amazing bereavement aftercare service, it enables funeral donations to be collected, and makes it easier to share funeral information.
The pandemic increased the usage of MuchLoved. The extraordinary times we went through showed how important online tributes are for families coping with a bereavement. We had a lot of sign-ups very quickly from funeral directors.
Now even though funerals are back to normal MuchLoved is still being used much more than it was before the pandemic. Funeral directors who started using MuchLoved during the pandemic have carried on, there are more tribute pages being created and we’re processing more in-memory donations for charities.
I think MuchLoved has been a success because from the outset we put the needs of bereaved people first and that’s always underpinned all our development and everything we do. The tribute pages need to accommodate a whole range of emotions like grief and anger and commemoration and pride.
Sometimes I worry that we could do so much more. There are so many being bereaved every day. We are in such a good position to help more people, and I can see the potential. I’m still as passionate as ever about MuchLoved. It’s been a lot of work, and a lot of strain, but also a lot of joy and fun. The team have put their heart and soul into MuchLoved and continue to do so. I’m immensely grateful for that. Some of them have been with us well over ten years.
We have amazing partnerships. We set up a training team this year and we have been busy building digital resources and much-improved literature. We are building our technical team, the support team has been building and all the departments are getting better and better. It’s an exciting place to work.
Of course, I wish Phil had never died, but I’ve accepted his death and used it to inspire life. I feel fortunate that his death led me to do something I’m immensely proud of, something that has made a difference. Some good has come out of it. I think Phil would be chuffed and he’d be very supportive, and that’s a motivation for me. Thinking about the unique support that MuchLoved provides to people at a difficult time is what drives me on now.’
