Posted on 04/11/2005 8:59:33 AM PDT by qam1
Haydee Leon is planning her wedding with a spreadsheet in hand.
It's the “something new” prospective brides need these days.
Leon and her fiance, Chris Mandernach, 25, have set a budget for their Sept. 18 wedding at The Clubhouse on Baltimore, and she's determined not to overspend.
When they got engaged in December, they decided they wanted a wedding that was elegant and in good taste, “but without going overboard,” says Leon, 26, who lives in Overland Park. “Something that was just reasonable.”
In the end, they decided that $16,000 was reasonable. It is, compared to the cost of a typical U.S. wedding, which is now more than $26,000.
That's almost 50 percent more than what they cost in 1990 according to the latest estimates from the industry.
Americans, it seems, are in love with love, and a savvy industry that throws seminars for photographers and wedding planners on how to “sell the bride” is a more-than-willing suitor.
From TV shows such as “Whose Wedding Is It Anyway?” and movies such as “Bride and Prejudice,” to bridal expos, celebrity wedding coverage and Internet bridal sites, everywhere you turn, someone is saying “I do” — or at least telling us how to do it. This weekend will surely bring up the subject again with Prince Charles' royal wedding in England.
Today, the bride-to-be has her pick of at least 77 bridal magazines on newsstands, more than four times as many as the 18 published in 1989, according to the National Directory of Magazines.
Most of them will tell the happy couple how to save money and many a father of the bride has joked about mortgaging the house to pay for his daughter's wedding.
These days, that's no laughing matter.
Before World War I, the average wedding cost one-third of the annual U.S. median family income, says Alan Fields in Boulder, Colo. He and his wife, Denise, have become well-known watchdogs of the wedding industry.
By the 1960s, it had risen to half. Today, wedding costs are closing in on 60 percent of annual family incomes, says Fields, co-author of the popular Bridal Bargains series of books.
It's all too much for some couples. The commercialization of weddings has caused inflation and people are forgetting what the ceremony is about, says Pete Tarantino, a 35-year-old Kansas City loan officer who just got married to Susan, 31.
“It's important to stay focused on spending a lifetime together and not just a day,” Tarantino says of the planning process. “It's about your relationship with your spouse and your relationship with God. Stay away from the magazines and the TV shows, and be involved with each other.”
“The focus has moved to the bride's dress, the size of the ring or how many people are at the reception, when it needs to be the exact opposite,” he says.
How did we get to this point? The idea of the big, fancy wedding is seductive.
Cele Otnes, an associate professor of business administration at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, spent four years researching weddings for a book she co-wrote with colleague Elizabeth Pleck called Cinderella Dreams: The Allure of the Lavish Wedding.
One reason the lavish wedding has taken off to near recession-proof costs, they argue, is that “it allows people to experience magic in their lives,” Otnes says.
It's guilt-free magic, she says, because people tell themselves this is a once-in-a-lifetime event, though that's not necessarily true anymore. Half of all new unions involve at least one partner who is marrying for a second time. And there's no more reluctance in spending big on a second wedding either. Encore weddings in the United States average about $12,000, Otnes says.
Weddings also let people “remember themselves as close as they'll ever get to being celebrities,” Otnes says. “People are young, and probably the most attractive they'll ever be, given the amount of pampering that's gone into one day.
“When you think about the powerful task that it accomplishes, it's hard to beat. You get a lot of sociological and emotional bang for the buck, even at $26,000.”
Romance is a huge driver of consumerism, Otnes says, quoting one of her sources who suggested that the lavish wedding allows us to express our romance with consumption and our consumption of romance.
So is it any wonder that the fairytale wedding has become the picture of a romantic marriage?
“A fantasy is much more appealing than reality,” says Susan Shapiro Barash, professor of gender studies at Marymount Manhattan College and author of The New Wife: The Evolving Role of the American Wife.
The glamorized wedding epitomizes the hope for happily ever after and with that idea comes the willingness to create it at any cost, says Barash.
And it's important to today's young bride that her marriage is enduring. These are the daughters of baby-boomer women, many of whom are divorced or have never been married but often have careers and educations, she says.
But when these brides look at their grandmothers, they see women who have been married for 50 years to the same man. They want that kind of marriage. They want to live “happily ever after.”
“The 21st-century wife is determined to not have a stressful marriage, but to have a very romantic, exciting marriage,” Barash says.
Sarah Burkindine of Prairie Village has seen the fantasy of it all while planning her Nov. 5 wedding to Brian Roberts, 32.
“Weddings are becoming more of an event,” says Burkindine, 28. “I definitely think people are spending more these days on weddings than they did years ago.
“My aunt got married in the early to mid-‘80s and my grandmother paid for it by herself, and that wedding was much less than $10,000,” says Burkindine. “My sister recently got married and had a wedding similar to that one, but 20 years later the cost more than doubled.”
That is closer to the cost of the average $20,000 Kansas City wedding, according to local bridal publications.
“Weddings are more extravagant,” Burkindine says. “It's not your basic dress, tux and 50 guests. People get wrapped up in the little details, like favors, chair covers, huge halls, big bands and outstanding florists. But there's a supply and demand, and people will pay for it.”
It would be hard for any one person to pay for all of the cost themselves, Burkindine says. Her budget is made up of a large contribution from her parents, some from his parents and a few thousand from the couple.
That's not necessarily a new phenomenon, but this pitching in to cover the cost of a wedding is happening more often these days, wedding experts say.
“It's just becoming more unusual for the bride's family to foot the bill,” says Kara Corridan, executive editor of Modern Bride and Elegant Bride magazines in New York. “It happens, but it's not the norm anymore. It's almost seen as old-fashioned.
“We know a lot of couples bringing in a nice income and they feel funny turning around asking their parents to pay for it.”
Even arbiters of etiquette such as Peggy Post contend that it's not unusual for families to pool their money to get their sons and daughters hitched. Today, approximately 25 percent of weddings are paid for solely by the bride's parents, according to wedding industry estimates.
“I think that's a reflection of that $20,000 figure,” says Alan Fields. “It's just a lot of money.”
The Cinderella Dreams authors found little backlash to the lavish wedding during their four years of research. But they didn't meet Kansas City couple Jamillah Duckett and her husband, Quentin. They steered well away from the marketing and hype when it came to their 2004 wedding.
“My wedding was simple, intimate, elegant and romantic,” says Duckett, 29, whose wedding cost about $2,500. “I only had my sister stand up with me, and his brother stood up with him, and I would not change a thing about my day.”
Duckett thinks people have forgotten what a wedding is supposed to be.
“Spending your whole life savings makes for a dream wedding, but it's not the (blueprint) for a healthy marriage,” Duckett says.
“One of the main things for my husband and I is that we had to remember that this was our day, because everyone is going to give you their opinion of how they think your wedding should go and that, in itself, can be stressful,” Duckett says.
“Just remember the purpose and you'll be fine.”
LOL! The poor grooms never usually do. :-(
I had to read that a few times. Details, please! What could possibly make it cost so much??
Carolyn
Pete Tarantino, a 35-year-old Kansas City loan officer who just got married to Susan, 31.
?It's important to stay focused on spending a lifetime together and not just a day,? Tarantino says of the planning process. ?It's about your relationship with your spouse and your relationship with God. Stay away from the magazines and the TV shows, and be involved with each other.?
?The focus has moved to the bride's dress, the size of the ring or how many people are at the reception, when it needs to be the exact opposite,? he says.
This is man with a good head on his shoulders! This marriage won't last, he is too sensible.
My cousin wasted 80K on her wedding. She nagged the poor schmuck so much he was in drug rehab within two months.
I am not allowed to tell how little it cost. ;-)
At the time, I was a Senior Airman and the DeBeers "3 months salary" mandate most pitiful buggers follow would have cost me more than the wedding did, and that's if I only went on raw pay without considering my quarters and meal allowances.
My advice to anyone planning on getting married: The industry sees you coming, and they have leverage. Opt out. The point is to celebrate your union with each other and Almighty God. It should be fun, not months of strees followed by years of debt.
Yeah, my ring is history. We tried to recover it, but no dice. Ah well. I learned a lesson from that...resize your rings if they get loose! LOL
For one, it was very large. Something like 400-500 people (including the Limbaugh family, Senator Ashcroft and whoever happened to be the Governor of Missouri at the time). Since Cape Girardeau is sort of in the middle of nowhere, they had to have caterers and musicians come in from St. Louis, so that added greatly to the cost.
His mother really went over the top, though, from what I understand. Ice sculptures everywhere, among other things.
Another friend's family spent close to $400K for a wedding.
My wedding cost something like $80K for 125 people. $15,000 of that was to rent out the Museum of Women in the Arts in DC for the reception, though. Thankfully, my father-in-law paid for everything, pretty much. I thought the price tag was over the top, but was outvoted.
I thought the price tag was over the top, but was outvoted.
Like I said above, the groom usually is. ;-)
My wife designed her own. She visualized exactly what she wanted, looked through a ton of bridal mags, cut out the parts from dresses in the mags that matched her mental picture, and created a picture she called "the Bride of Frankenstein because it was pieced together from said clippings. She took it to the seamstress and voila! Awesome wedding dress.
Yeah, we had an interesting discussion about this a few weeks ago. Our kids were highly amused and appalled at how the market can be SO manipulated!
Just curious, how long have you been married?
Spending much dinero on a one day event never appealed to me, but I don't have a problem with it if other people want to.
I have seen problems result, though, when middle class families (such as the one I come from) try to put on a shindig that rivals those of wealthy people who can easily afford them.
Young couples, early twenties, with no assets or savings, will go into debt, or put their parents there (second mortgages and all) to have the blowout wedding. I have known people who did this and wound up divorced a few years later, with a big load of debt to divvy up in court.
I mean really....what does a girl need with a $1,600. (in 1992 dollars) wedding dress when she and her beloved are living paycheck to paycheck, no real skills, no education, and parents of modest means. Sometimes people lose their heads over these things.
Damn, I'm in the wrong line of work.
Absolutely. He just gets yelled at by the female members on both sides of the family if he even dares to object to anything.
Anyway, it wasn't like there was any benefit to me if my wife kept the price low. So, I wasn't going to die on that partcular hill.
The wedding industry is amazing. It has brainwashed American women. And let's not even talk about the engagement ring industry.....
Your modest wedding was sensible but poignant but sadly today the tables have turned and conspicious consumption is the name of the game.
From what I see today,romance,weddings,marriage-the values I grew up with as something to treasure-have all turned into this weird charade of status seeking and false illusions.
Maybe it will all come together in the next life when God is in command.As far as I'm concerned,this bitter earth offers nothing but illusions.
Nah! My problem was that she wanted my opinion too much! I was content to let her plan every little detail if she wanted. To me, asking me to plan the minutiae of the ceremony was like asking, "Mr. Silverback, when we deliver the $100 million dollars to your door, what color should the armored truck be?" Besides, I thought the dress uniform was appropriate because I was wearing it when we met, and to quote her, she "never had a chance."
The wedding industry is amazing. It has brainwashed American women.
****
Yes, it really has.
I can't imagine spending that much. More than 5 years salary, gross? No way....
A good friend of mine had a huge shindig down in Newport RI - rented out the Astor's old place on Mansion row there.
That one was such a blast that it may have been worth the insane money it probably cost.
LQ
A ___________ and his ______________ are soon _______________.
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