Nac subsidiary joins TEAR franchise, linking customers’ end-of-life planning enquiries to funeral services

On 21 October 2026, Tear announced that Nac Life Partners, a wholly owned subsidiary of Nac, had joined its TEAR funeral home franchise. The company will enter the funeral sector and begin operating funeral homes under the TEAR brand. The move follows enquiries about end-of-life planning and funerals from customers of its existing businesses.

Existing customer enquiries prompted the move

The Nac Group provides a range of everyday services, including its Duskin business, CreCla water delivery, housing and resale operations. Parent company Nac is listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange’s Prime Market, and the new franchisee, Nac Life Partners, is its wholly owned subsidiary.

According to the announcement, Nac Life Partners had been receiving increasing numbers of enquiries about end-of-life planning and funerals through its customer relationships in resale and other businesses. Its entry into the sector is positioned as a response to needs identified through those existing operations.

Central to the decision to join was the group’s experience in locally focused customer service and outlet management. It concluded that combining these strengths with Tear’s funeral expertise would provide a basis for developing the new business. Rather than simply adding another brand, the stated approach is to extend existing customer relationships into funeral services.

Promoting TEAR membership and building local connections

Following its entry into the franchise, the company plans to actively promote the ‘TEAR no Kai’ membership scheme to customers of the Nac Group’s existing businesses. It intends to draw on relationships with people already using its everyday services to develop the funeral business.

It also plans to broaden its local connections through end-of-life planning seminars and community events. By combining membership promotion to existing customers with community activities, it aims to create synergies with its established businesses.

It is important to distinguish the confirmed franchise agreement from the customer initiatives still to come. Membership promotion, seminars and events are described as future plans. The announcement does not report any customer acquisition or financial results from these measures.

A distinctive feature of the new business is that its links with existing operations extend beyond funeral home management to the end-of-life planning enquiries that may precede a funeral. The increase in customer enquiries, alongside plans for membership promotion and community activities, is key to understanding the decision to join.

Combining local operating experience with funeral expertise

Tear provides franchisees with funeral-sector expertise, staff training and operational systems. Nac Life Partners will enter the sector by combining this specialist support with its group’s experience in customer service and outlet management.

Under this division of responsibilities, the franchisee brings local connections and operating experience developed through its existing businesses, while the franchisor supplies funeral expertise and support with staffing and operations. The stated rationale for joining was the opportunity to combine these complementary strengths.

For Japan’s franchise community, the move offers an example of diversification prompted by customer enquiries within an existing business. It highlights the importance not only of the franchise brand, but also of how a company can apply its own customer relationships and operating experience to a new sector.

Expanding the funeral home network with like-minded partners

The announcement put the Tear Group’s network at 230 funeral homes across Japan, handling more than 26,000 funerals annually. Cumulative membership of ‘TEAR no Kai’ also exceeded 570,000. These figures describe Tear’s established business base, not the individual performance of newly joined Nac Life Partners.

Tear intends to continue expanding its franchise network with partners that share its philosophy. Nac Life Partners’ entry brings a group with several everyday-service businesses into funeral home operations as part of that strategy.

The main significance of this news lies less in the size of the network than in how existing customer enquiries led to the franchise decision. The model combines specialist funeral knowledge with customer relationships built through resale and other services, locally focused customer service and outlet management experience.

Practical takeaway: Companies considering a franchise should review the enquiries they receive from existing customers, then distinguish between the needs they can meet through their own operating experience and those requiring specialist support from the franchisor.