Becs’ Story – How Outside The Box Caskets Began
- Outside The Box Caskets
- Aug 9, 2025
- 6 min read
Updated: 23 hours ago
This is a bit of a deeper story…
For people who don’t know the background to Outside The Box, there’s more to it than just making and selling caskets.
This is a story about rethinking traditions, about taking a material most people overlook and turning it into something strong, beautiful, and meaningful. It’s about asking why things have to be the way they are and then doing the work to change them.
It’s also a story about patience. About chipping away at an industry that doesn’t move quickly. About holding onto an idea when it would have been easier to let it go.
And at the heart of it all is Becs, her Nana, and an idea that just wouldn’t go away.
The idea first came to Becs at her Nana’s funeral in 2011. She remembered looking at her casket, shiny, heavy, and cold, and wondering why they all looked the same. Why did something so personal have to feel so impersonal? Why did they all look like that?
That thought tapped into something that had been part of her for years and that thought didn’t go away.
Back in the early 2000s, while studying industrial design, Becs explored all kinds of creative projects. She even exhibited a piece of furniture at the Salone del Mobile in Milan, one of the world’s biggest design fairs. In her final year project she also created a piece of furniture using paper pulp. It was an unusual choice at the time as eco-friendly materials weren’t really in fashion, but she was drawn to its possibilities. That project sparked a lasting fascination with how cardboard and paper-based materials can be engineered into something strong, versatile, and beautiful.
At the time, “eco-friendly” design barely made it into the university curriculum. It was treated like a nice-to-have, not the main event. Becs liked it anyway, but the industry wasn’t ready. Fast forward a decade, and the world had changed. Sustainability wasn’t just a buzzword, it was an expectation.
And this wasn’t the kind of cardboard you find in a fridge box or courier packaging. The material she would one day use for her caskets is a specially made, high-performance recycled cardboard, designed for strength and structure, and precise engineering works together to create something far stronger than most people imagine.
By the time she began developing her casket designs, Becs already had years of design experience under her belt. But this project was different. It combined her creative skills, her love of innovative materials, and her deep belief that there had to be another way.So when the memory of her Nana’s casket collided with her long-standing curiosity about cardboard, the idea began to take shape: a casket that was strong, beautiful, and environmentally kind, without being bound to the traditional coffin look.
Becs thought, what if you could design one that was as beautiful as it was strong? Something that could be carried with dignity, and that didn’t have to look like every coffin you’ve ever seen? She wanted something modern but timeless, that could be carried with pride, and that broke down naturally without harming the earth.
Cardboard caskets have existed for well over 20 years, but they weren’t good quality. Most were literally just boxes: weak, flimsy, you couldn’t use them for a proper funeral service, you definitely couldn’t carry them, no pallbearers, and frankly, a bit embarrassing to use. The eco idea was there, but the design was missing.
Turning the Idea into Design
In 2018, she started sketching. Pages filled with ideas for shapes, lid angles, and structures that could challenge the traditional coffin look. From there, she began making small prototypes out of cardboard - miniature versions she could hold. Those early models were simple, but they helped turn the ideas on paper into something tangible, ready for the next stage of testing.
She visited funeral homes, taking the temperature of the market. Not everyone liked the idea. Some directors tilted their heads politely and said things like, “Not sure about that, sounds like a good idea, but…” Others said, “We don’t believe in eco” or “Cardboard isn’t dignified.” Others shook their heads outright. The funeral industry is deeply traditional, and change can be a slow process.
She kept going anyway.
The early days were not glamorous. Her garage became a workshop slash test lab, littered with offcuts and prototypes. She built testing rigs out of Kiwi milk crates, stacked weights using cement bags from the local hardware shop, and pushed each design until it failed. She refined the design again and again, focusing on how the board fitted together, the layering, the way the fluting worked, over-engineering it so it could be carried with confidence and dignity.
Through the testing process, plenty of people offered “helpful” suggestions, things like, “Just add a plastic clip,” “A cable tie would make that so much easier,” or even “Why not just use staples?” But Becs was determined to keep the design 100% natural. No plastic, no metal. It had to be made entirely from materials that would return to the earth.
That persistence paid off. Her casket became the first cardboard casket in New Zealand to be fully certified by Natural Burials NZ. Becs remains directly involved in the making, from tying the lid ties by hand to creating the lid print designs, ensuring every casket reflects the same care and values that inspired the very first design.
By the end of 2019, she had a design she was proud of. It was time to put it through official testing. Partnering with one of New Zealand’s top casket manufacturers, they ran the full testing process, including the big one: loading the casket with 320 kilograms to prove its strength. It passed with ease.
By 2020, she was set to launch, and then the first COVID lockdown hit. While the world shut down, Becs pressed on, officially launching in the middle of the chaos.Recognition came quickly and unexpectedly. She won Gold at the Good Design Awards in Australia, Gold at the Australasian Packaging Design Awards, and was nominated for sustainability and innovation awards.
But the best wins weren’t the accolades. They were the quiet moments when a
funeral director who once had no interest in her caskets would say a family had asked for one, so they ordered it. Or when a family would tell Becs it was exactly what Mum wanted.
“Dad’s wish was to be placed in a cardboard box. Our wish was to honour him with a dignified and meaningful send-off. Thanks to Outside The Box Caskets, he got both.”
Another funeral director said:
“We have used Outside The Box caskets a number of times and our families absolutely love them! Whether it is to provide a certified eco-friendly option or just a simple, no-fuss casket that can be drawn on, covered in stickers, decoupaged, or decorated by the ‘artist’ in your family, Outside The Box caskets are the perfect solution.”
Five years on, Outside The Box Caskets are available to funeral homes across New Zealand and Australia. Some funeral directors still aren’t convinced, and that’s fine. They’re not for everyone. But for the families who want something different, simple, beautiful, and sustainable, they’re an option that didn’t exist before.
This isn’t a budget product. It’s not “just a box.” It’s the result of years of design thinking, engineering, and stubbornness, created by someone who knew there had to be another way. Becs often says Nana was the reason she started, but the families who use her caskets are the reason she keeps going. And in a world where so many things look the same, she’s proud to offer something that’s truly… outside the box!
Because at the end of the day, it’s for the people who, at one of life’s hardest moments, deserve something that feels just right and a bit of a departure from the ordinary. That’s what it’s about.Also, a big shout-out to the support she’s had from the industry and the people who have backed her from day one to keep going.
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