Giffen-Mack Funeral Home & Cremation Centre

Convenient, accommodating location

Conveniently located at 2570 Danforth Avenue, our funeral home is directly adjacent to the Main Subway Station for the TTC Bloor Subway Line and is less than a 5-minute walk from the Danforth Station GO Transit Station. Additionally, we are 30 minutes from Toronto Pearson Airport and 15 minutes from Toronto Island Airport and have ample parking available. Giffen-Mack Funeral Home & Cremation Centre is also near 4 Toronto cemeteries and crematoriums.

To better serve you and your family, Giffen-Mack Funeral Home & Cremation Centre is fully accessible; we are even equipped with a chair lift. The Peter Giffin Memorial Chapel has seating available for over 100 guests, with an available overflow room that includes full audio and visual technology for approximately 60 guests. We also have 4 newly renovated visitation rooms.

Personalized funerals

Our mission at Giffen-Mack Funeral Home & Cremation Centre is to help families create personalized funerals and memorials. This approach keeps us open to traditional religious rites as well as contemporary gatherings that deeply reflect a person's life. That means that whether you want a basic cremation with cremated remains scattered in a personally meaningful place, a funeral at the funeral home with cemetery burial nearby, or a modern celebration of life with live music and a send-off that expresses the passions of yourself or your loved one, we are happy to deliver. If you can imagine it, we can make it happen.

Compassionate care

When you choose Giffen-Mack Funeral Home & Cremation Centre, our compassionate personnel will provide you with arrangements and services to help you through one of the most personal and challenging stages of life. We understand the emotional and difficult experience that accompanies the loss of a loved one.

Please contact us if you require any assistance, or if you would like more information about our services.

History

The early years of Giffen-Mack Funeral Home & Cremation Centre

Back in the early 1920s, N. B. Cobbledick owned and operated the funeral home where the present Giffen-Mack Funeral Home & Cremation Centre stands today. Ernie McFarquare purchased the Cobbledick Funeral Home and changed the name. Several years later, the funeral home was sold to Mr. Mack, and once again, the name was changed to The Mack Burial Company. Mr. Cobbledick passed away on March 8, 1946.

In November of 1948 or 1949, Peter Giffen and his wife, Doris, purchased the funeral home. Although our funeral home name is Giffen-Mack, Mr. Giffen and Mr. Mack were never partners. But Peter Giffen decided that it would be better to keep the Mack name in the name of the funeral home so that the community would still feel comfortable in dealing with a family-owned funeral home under different management.

During the 2 years of 1948 and 1949, our records show that the Giffen-Mack Funeral Home performed 185 services.

In 1965, directly behind the funeral home, the Main Street Subway station was built, followed by the GO station stop over the Main Street Bridge, thus making Giffen-Mack Funeral Home very accessible to our families.

Giffen-Mack Funeral Home & Cremation Centre expands and renovates

In 1969, Peter Giffen carried out some necessary renovations in order to keep up with the changes in the Toronto community and his ever-growing business. He purchased 3 stores—a bakery, a shoe store and a fur store that were attached to the west side of the funeral home—and decided to build around the existing building in any way that he felt possible.

The new renovations at Giffen-Mack Funeral Home & Cremation Centre included an upper-level floor that housed 6 visitation rooms, a lounge, washrooms, a large preparation room, a chapel and an elevator. The renovations also included more available parking on the west side of the building and a 5-car garage.

The idea for these renovations paid off—from 1973 to 1974, Giffen-Mack Funeral Home performed 958 services.

The Peter Giffen Memorial Chapel 

In 1982, Peter Giffen retired after serving 50 years in the funeral service industry and passed his funeral home over to his son, David Giffen. On March 23, 2019, we rechristened our chapel in honour of Peter Giffen. A commemorative plaque was installed just above the entrance to the Peter Giffen Memorial Chapel along with his photo. The Giffen family was present for the special ribbon cutting event. 

More about this historical Toronto funeral home

Historical artifacts are still within Giffen-Mack Funeral Home at Danforth Avenue. The garage that we have today was originally the preparation room, and the original sink that was in this preparation room is still in use in the present-day garage. The selection room on the lower level was the one and only lounge and the office desk used downstairs in the large arrangement office was originally used for a baby set-up.

In 2006, we became a member of the Dignity Memorial® network, North America’s largest network of funeral, burial and cremation providers.