ROME (Reuters) - Death is hardly something to look forward to, but one Italian funeral home is trying to make the afterlife a tad more tempting by using bikini-clad women to sell its coffins.
On its site http:/ www.cofanifunebri.it, the Rome-based funeral home and coffin factory Cisa features its hand-crafted caskets alongside models sipping champagne or reclining seductively on the lids.
"We wanted to make the whole idea of picking your coffin less serious, maybe even make people laugh a bit," Giuseppe Tenara, one of the partners, said.
Near-naked women are used to sell everything in Italy from computers to chocolate bars, but Cisa has taken the advertising ploy to new limits.
The page featuring the firm's "Madonna" coffin shows a pouting woman in zebra shorts and high-heel boots kneeling next to the casket, while in "Empire Style," a blonde donning a black G-string leans on a coffin and turns her backside to the camera.
"Unfortunately the site hasn't helped sales much, because we mostly get calls from far away places like Greece and Spain instead of Rome," Tenara told Reuters.
That hasn't stopped Cisa from creating an online "sexy calendar" with yet more temptresses frolicking among the coffins.
Still, not all clients have been charmed.
"Some people are scandalized, but we just explain that we're trying to make people laugh," Tenara said.