I so agree. But that's the current practice here. BUT I guaranteed that when the Ellebud girls and boy get married (if we are providing the flowers) I will make sure that we can take the flowers and give it to whom we please. I will make sure the contract says that. If I have to I will purchase the urns/vases myself.

Exactly what I was doing lol...the sales manager actually discounted nearly $10,000 off the dress so the parents would quit haggling :eek: Still, $15,000 for a dress is stilll waaaaay too much!

Say Yes to the Dress:Atlanta?!?

I just saw the commercial!
THis is an article I found on google:

http://www.stylelist.com/2010/03/24/...idal-spin-off/

Saw that too! The things they were saying about the bride and her budget in the commercial were really mean!

Actually some people do haggle in dept stores with some success. And you do haggle over other big ticket items, cars, houses, *is at a loss for things that cost 10k or more*
But then, I suck at haggling.

Totally not interested. No one can replace that Kleinfeld's crew.

There's a wedding dress show on WE I think that takes place down in Texas. The saleswomen are rude. They don't ask the girls what their budget is (first thing Kleinfeld's ask) and I always see them putting them in dresses that they can't afford, but somehow end up buying anyways. I also never see them asking what style dress they want. They just take a look at them, and pick out whatever they want.

I went to Bridals by Lori (the location where they're filming the Atlanta version of the show) back when I was doing my wedding dress shopping. The sales staff were what I'd describe as cold. Everywhere else I went the sales staff were warm and friendly. It was almost as though the staff at Bridals by Lori felt that it was a pleasure for you to serve them.

It was a nice selection of dresses but the store is definitely not for the budget-conscious bride. Also, I told my sales associate what my budget was and she seemed to completely ignore it. She brought me some dresses that were more than $1,000 outside my budget. Luckily, I wasn't a fan of them but a friend of mine who shopped there fell in love with a dress that was $2500 outside her budget. I felt bad because nothing she tried on at other stores could even match how she felt in the dress at Bridals by Lori.

If I ever end up picking out a wedding dress I'm going to lay down the law: Bring me a dress over budget and I shop somewhere else. On the show it seems like one of two things happens when they do this: either the bride buys a dress she cannot actually afford (which I will not do, hands down, end of story) or she leaves obsessing over the dress that can't be topped.

When I got married in 1989, my parents, who paid for everything, gave me a budget of $5000. Anything more than that I had to pay for myself, but anything left over, we got to keep. So I shopped carefully. My dress was a discontinued sample that cost about $300 with alterations. It needed to be cleaned, which the bridal salon did at no charge. I put it on and loved it, my mom loved it and that was it. A crafty friend made my veil as a wedding gift, and another friend did my bouquets with silk flowers. We had our reception at our parish hall (which was more like a hotel ballroom than a typical church hall with basketball hoops and a bingo board.) We ended up keeping about $500 and spent it on furniture which we still have. You can watch your spending and still have a lovely wedding - and 20-year and counting marriage!

My best friend had the most gorgeous and unique dress of all my friends getting married. Price? $600. I was amazed when she told me.

Exactly, and when it comes to money, people should have no problem being firm.

Plus, I find it hard to believe that it is NECESSARY to spends thousands on a wedding gown. It might take a little more time and effort to shop around and find the perfect dress with a smaller budget, but reasonably priced dresses that aren't horrible are there. I have a formal dress that I joke will be my wedding dress...it won't really, but it was a $600 dress from a popular designer and was meant to be an evening gown, but really could be a wedding dress just as well. Now I know to think outside the box.

My daughter's Presents dress (The Reluctant PNM) was a bridal gown. That, or a deb gpwm. Quite frankly, I would go back to this designer when DDs get engaged. And trust me, the dress with seed pearls and some glitz was NOWHERE near the thousand dollar mark, although on sale. When I married I borrowed a dress (big mistake...at the last minute the first bride, who wore the dress for her vows and then changed out of it saying, "Get this hideous thing off me!!!! I never want to see it again!!!!", said that she didn't want me to wear it. This was four days before the wedding.

Today I would just go to a store and buy an evening dress and be done with it. At the time I was overwhelmed, so I wore "that dress." But the dress I wore was the same dress that Grace Kelly wore for her wedding, alencon lace and all. (not Grace Kelly's dress itself, but the same designer, fabric etc.) ANd the "owner" took it back and threw it out. She threw it out not only because I had worn it, but because it reminded her of her mother, the last being the most importent. Thirty three years ago that dress was $1,500. OMG.

From watching this show you'd think it was normal for wedding gowns to be $5000 and up. It's not. In 2/3 of the shops I went to, almost every gown was less than $1,500. The only ones that are thousands of dollars are designer/couture dresses. You can find hundreds/thousands of beautiful dresses - in nice fabrics, I might add - for a fraction of the price of a designer dress. I would never pay a designer price tag for a dress I'm going to wear once, even if it is my wedding gown.