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.”
Well, to put it in perspective for these folks $250K is about 3-4 months gross salary.
LOL!!! Sad, but true. There was very little planning to our wedding and reception, so Mr. RK was pretty safe there.
I love reading all the different ways Freepers got married. Everything from very small and simple to extravagant.
My dress was $250. Had it made by a local seamstress - it was pretty much made out of linen tablecloth material (white on white cotton with a sheen to it). It was easily the most comfortable dress I've ever worn - no itchy lace or annoying pearly thingies to deal with. Good thing it was comfortable, I ended up moving chairs in it just before the wedding started :lol:.
DH wore a gray suit - he had needed to buy one anyway so instead of spending the money on a tux he just bought a suit instead. I told all the guys (his bro, his dad, and my dad) to wear gray suits and white shirts (they all already had them) and I supplied matching ties for them all that I bought from the Lands End catalog.
My sister was my only bridesmaid (like his bro was for him), and it was so nice and easy to tell her "wear something that goes with a gray suit and a maroon tie". I told my mother and my MIL the same thing.
Bingo, instant color-coordinated wedding with very little effort!
The only thing I really didn't like was the headdress the florist sent me. I had wanted a wreath of greenery with a few white flowers in it, instead I got this wire circlet with sparse greenery and a daisy in the middle of it that looked like a miner's headlamp.
So I went out in the backyard, picked some attractive green weeds from next to where DH's motorcycle was parked, and stuck them in the circlet to fill it out.
It looked much better after that :lol: .
LQ
Yes, I figured with that guest list the wedding probably wasn't driving them to the poorhouse. :-)
Three years this Saturday, best three years of our lives!
You apparently are not aware of the many, many practical uses of diamonds that such as rubies cannot touch. Showpiece-quality diamonds are probably extremely rare. Diamonds are the "hardest thing in existence" and also extremely conductive, and as such are in huge demand by various industries.
Given all that, they are probably not rip-offs.
OILLINE, trust me, the diamond industry is a controlled and manipulated market... Gem Quality diamonds are not remotely as rare as DeBeer's et al want you to believe.
Yes there are many non Gemstone applications for diamonds....
Diamonds of huge size of gem quality like the Hope diamond are rare, however 1 ct and lower gem quality stones are not remotely as rare as the Diamond companies want you to believe. They are far more common than other gemstones... that's reality.
Its damn impressive that they have been able to keep such a scam going so long and such control over the marketplace/supply to such a degree. Trust me though, gem quality diamonds are not remotely as rare as the large diamond companies have conned folks into believing.
It's all relative. If you need to go into massive debt to pay for a $20,000 wedding, you should probably consider spending less. If $250K was burning a hole in your pocket, why not have a massive gala that will be remembered by all in attendance?
DeBeers executives can't visit the US or own property here, for fear of being sued or charged under anti-trust and/or RICO laws.
We're getting married on June 18th, and with approximately 100-125 guests, it's probably going to be around 10k. Of course I want a beautiful wedding - but I also want a great marriage. (I'm looking forward to the honeymoon more than the wedding!!)
You've apparently never met Bridezilla...
I can beat you on that...I got married ten minutes after I got engaged. :-)
This 20-something is not a moron! Neither is my fiance. We already own a home, own both of our cars, and have no debt! Our wedding isn't putting us into debt - we've been saving for the year and a half we've been engaged in order to pay for the majority of it ourselves! :-)
And we're are going to have a nice party. But we're not morons!
Divorce was 400 Grand!
Well just to keep in mind.. if you are in your early 20s and planning on spending 20k on your wedding... if you put that 20k in a growth stock mutual fund making about 1012% on average... you will retire with over 1 Million dollars in your retirement account without ever adding another penny to it... (assuming 25 years old and retiring at 65)...
Sorry, but blowing 26k for a 1 day party is well, just foolhearty.
If you aren't going into debt, more power to you, from what I have seen, most folks who are spending 20k or more on a wedding most certainly are borrowing to do it.
And you consumated it in between? :) Sorry, it was just too easy.
Oh I know about all the industrial uses of diamonds, but they're not the prettied up kind that shine in jewelry.
The high demand for diamonds both in the jewelry as well as industrial markets I'm sure has a great deal to do w/the high prices.
Rubies nor other gemstones don't have the value exactly because they don't have the qualities to be any good to industry. Although those same qualities are probably what add to their allure generally for jewels. Diamonds are very tough whether "ugly" or beautiful - assuming you don't lose it, nothing will hurt your diamond. It will not chip or scratch.
Yeah, putting that down on a house is a huge winner, because 5 yrs later, most people in Calif have over $250k of equity. Not that you would take out a second to go out and party, but having that cushion provides at least the mental comfort that you have a lot of leeway come what may.
Think of what that $ can do for your future. More than 1/2 of all marriages break up over money.
What about scholarships for the future kids? House down payment. Heck, even if you buy a vehicle cash in hand that is more money for the future.
This kind of spending for essentially ego is insane.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.