Funeral business with a Russian trace: who controls part of the market in Ukraine
1 November 11:17
As of October 2025, there are 541 legal entities and 2,767 individual entrepreneurs in Ukraine whose main activity is organizing burials and providing related services.
This is reported by "Komersant Ukrainian" with reference to YouControl Market data.
Analysts have found that the number of individual entrepreneurs is five times higher than the number of companies.
Most entrepreneurs are registered in Dnipropetrovs’k (269), Donetsk (252), Odesa (212), Kyiv (189) and Kharkiv (162) regions, as well as in Crimea (182).
Almost a third of the companies (151) in the funeral services sector are municipal companies established by local governments. Most of these companies are registered in Dnipropetrovska oblast (62), Donetsk oblast (58), Kyiv oblast (46), Crimea (42), Kyiv (42), and Zaporizka oblast (41).
In 2024, the total revenue of the utilities that published their financial statements amounted to UAH 1.1 billion, or 92% of the total market revenue. Among the leaders in terms of revenue:
- SCP “Spetskombinat PKPO” (Kyiv) – over UAH 100 million;
- Ritual Municipal Enterprise of Kharkiv City Council.
Private sector: “Intek is the leader with UAH 29.5 million
Among private companies, Intek LLC from Zaporizhzhia region received the largest revenue in 2024 – UAH 29.5 million. The company is headed by Olena Zenkina, the wife of Yuriy Zenkin, the former head of Metallurg Zaporizhzhia, who previously worked in local funeral services.
The top five private leaders also include:
- Royal Trans Group LLC (UAH 8 million);
- Ritual House Shine LLC (UAH 7.89 million);
- Etalon-KR LLC (UAH 7.5 million);
- LLC SPE “Greenstep” (UAH 5.8 million).
8% of funeral companies have a Russian trace
About 8% of companies (41), according to analysts, are likely to be re-registered under Russian law – these are companies from Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions.
Some of them have “twins” in the Russian register of legal entities, and some have co-owners from Russia. In particular, Lileya 2015 LLC, Dobra Pamyat LLC, and Irbis MP LLC, which have Russian participants in their structure.
Financial trends in the industry
Despite the fact that only a quarter of companies publish financial statements, revenues are growing. In 2024, the total revenue of the market amounted to UAH 1.2 billion, compared to UAH 1.1 billion in 2023 and UAH 894 million in 2022.
According to the Ministry of Community Development, Territories and Infrastructure, the total volume of funeral services provided in 2024 amounted to UAH 2.139 billion, and most burials – 79% – were performed by municipal services.
Last year, the Verkhovna Rada registered draft law No. 12189, which proposes to introduce a value-added tax (VAT) on the supply of burial services and to abolish the simplified taxation system for funeral service providers.
