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Jcrew has some pretty amazing dresses! I feel like there's been a lot of posts lately about Bee's amazing BM dress finds!
Yes! Which is why I based my search off of price. I found some that were $100 and I had a 20% discount. They weren't as cheap as I still would have liked but much cheaper than my girls expected to have to pay. One girl set aside $300!!! Now she can spend the rest of hair or make-up if she wants.
Yes! Which is why I offered to pay for half. Thank goodness I only have 2 girls... ugh! Hopefully they can find something locally without the "bridesmaid" label, that's just as nice.
Before shopping, I decided what price point I'd be looking for (under $200), and then just kind of looked until I found what I wanted. I purchased the dresses through the same salon where I got my dress, so my girls enjoyed a 15% discount, which was nice. Still, a good amount of guilt tagging along with it all!
@.twist.: That is SUPER nice! I was going to pay 1/2 if they couldn't pay in full because if they paid in full, they'd receive a 20% discount!
@M.Ruder: haha thanks. My conscious is happier, but my wallet is totally not! 20% off is a pretty good deal!! :)
Yea, I really feel bad about the dresses. Mine were $140 I think, from Alfred Angelo. I was looking for a certain fuchsia color, so it worked out nicely. And the bridal shop gave my MOH a free dress (which she needed b/c she wouldn't have been able to be in the wedding if not). Anyway, I LOVE Delia's and I was looking on there today to find more clothes. I saw a lot of dresses that I would like my BMs to wear. They are expensive for me ($80) but cheap for the wedding world. They're probably short though. You could go on a website like that if your girls don't wear big sizes, I'm not sure how big they make their dresses.
Yes, I too feel bad. After being a BM in other weddings I know how fast the amount can add up when you consider buying a dress, matching shoes, hair, possibly makeup, lodging, travel, and all the gifts for the bride. I told my MOH that I'm on the hunt for cheap BM dresses. She told me not to worry b/c she knows what she signed up for and we should try to make my day special (love her!). I guess I have to remember that all my BM's assume they will be contributing "x" amount of money to be in my weddding. I have been in two of my BM's weddings and paid for everything, which is what I expected when I accepted their invitation to be a BM. I guess the costs are now negated since they are in my wedding now.
I do have to say I'm still considering paying for half of their dresses ( I have 6 BM's), not requiring matching shoes, and also paying for their hair! My situation may be different b/c my entire wedding party is traveling a long distance to be in my wedding and they also need to pay for lodging. Decisions, decisions!
@ HoneyBear: I've heard Netbride.com and weddingshoppeinc.com- bridesmaid dresses are good places to buy discount dresses online. Several of the designers on Weddinshoppeinc even list their prices (not sure how much cheaper they are compared to buying at a bridal shop) and they seem really resonable. I found Bill Levkoff dresses for $120 on this website. I haven't ordered through these websites before, but they may be worth checking out!
I felt awful too! I wanted to just buy something online or at a department store, but none of the girls wanted to chance ordering online, and department stores wouldn't really work either since everyone is so scattered.
Honeybear: if you want to keep looking at ModCloth, there is a link you can click that shows you longer length dresses. I looked there until my BMs told me not to :/. Also, David's Bridal really does have nice dresses for BMs. I've gotten a couple from there, and I haven't had any problems with them.
My dresses are also EXPENSIVE but I don't feel bad about them for a few reasons
1. I am paying for part of every girls dress (about $50.00) to get them into the "reasonable" range of $150 per girl
2. I picked the dresses WAY in advance so the girls would have time both to budget and also to look for a sale/outlet version.
3. All of the girls told me that they consider it a better value to have a $200 dress that they will wear again (it's Navy blue silk....plenty of opportunities) than to have a $100 dress that they want to throw out or burn afterward.
They're your dear friends...they *will* tell you if it's too expensive
I picked dresses that were $89 but the shipping is fairly hefty, driving the price up to closer to $120. I bought my sister's since she is coming to the wedding from DC. I am not buying the other bridesmaid's, because she lives in Savannah and so the $120 is not an additional expense on top of traveling like my sister would have had. I tried to find a decently priced dress and gave her PLENTY of time to order it (wedding is in August and I picked them out in January) so the $120 shouldn't be too much of a strain. But I definitely was conscious of not choosing a dress that was crazy expensive.
I would seriously check out J.Crew because they have some super cute dresses and if you hit the site at the right time you can get them on sale!
Check out my post from yesterday about my experience! I hope this helps!
Mine are not getting bridesmaid dresses. And, I'm just giving them a color, and they can get any shade, any fabric. Lol
I set a price point, and when we ended up with dresses over that point I paid the difference for each BM.
I feel really bad, too. I wanted to keep them on the lower end but it was not easy. I literally have every body type you can think of in my wedding party and it is not easy to find something that works on everyone. I tried to give them the option to pick out dresses in different styles, but they all ended up liking the same one (well, my 2 MOHs are wearing a different dress, but it is similar to the BM one). I originally wanted shorter dresses, bc I am having a Sept wedding in the afternoon, but one girl hates her legs and really wanted long, and everyone agreed it looked better long. So we went with that dress, long. It cost $180 but since I bought my dress there they got a 20% discount, making it around $154.
There are some other costs, though. i have 2 out of town BMs and it will cost $10 extra for the dress to be shipped directly to them. Also, another BM is plus-sized and had to get the gown custom-made to her measurements, and that nearly doubled the cost of the dress! I felt so bad and in turn gave some money to her to help out. She isn't making a ton of money right now, so I felt awful making her do this. I even offered her to look at other dresses but she didn't want to be different. I tried to ease the budget on the girls by saying they could wear any shoes they want, as long as they are white, and several of them have shoes already that they can wear.
I think it is a known fact that if you are in a bridal party you are going to be spending some money. That is why you ask the girls, not tell them that they are included. If they know they can't afford it, I would think they would decline, or at least let you know ahead of time that they can't pay too much. It is nice to try to keep the dress cost low, but sometimes impossible to make it low enough. The wedding industry is just expensive. I asked all of my girls if the cost would be okay and they all agreed. I was/will be in most of my girls' weddings, and I just expect to do the same for them.
Not really because I was cost effective and got a good deal on the dresses even with the alterations it will be less than 150.00 for the girls. I didn't want to happen like when I was in a wedding and ended up with dress and alterations over 300 for a crappy looking falling apart dress for bm.
I was willing to go waaaay cheap, and in the end, even the unemployed one went with the $200 dress, but Priscilla of Boston had a 20% off sale one weekend and they got it then, so it was $160.
I felt bad, but they like the dress a lot.
I initially looked at dresses, but couldn't see myself "demanding" that my friends spend even $100 on a dress that I chose. In the end I simply told them to find a little black dress they loved. This way they would be comfortable with the style of the dress, they might re-wear it, and it'll be a price they are comfortable paying.
Yep, I just couldn't ask them to pay over $100 for a dress that I picked.
I found mine at JCPenny and they were $60, but w/ all the sales JCPenny has all the time they came out to like $50!
Is it normal to ask the BMs to pay for thier own dresses? I had thought I was expected to pay for these.
Yeah, I feel bad about it... that why I just decided to have my girls re-wear a dress we bought for a wedding we were all in before. It's the color I like and I helped pick it in the first place, so I liked it already!
I feel really bad about how expensive the BM dresses are, but my best friends picked them and they would have told me if they were too expensive (over $200). I paid the $100 deposit on one BM's dress. Weddings in general are very expensive for all involved--I'm considering just paying for hair or makeup for the girls instead of buying them more gifts (already got them earrings to wear).
Yes, I felt super bad, because I know how $$ can be tight, and you don't want to pry too much into people's finances, or put them on the spot. So, I did a TON of research...the Limited was awesome. They have a new bridal shop, with bm dresses that they would sooooooooooo totally wear again. A lot of the time they have a 33% off sale on dresses. Plus, I found a coupon for free shipping on their dresses. I took a lot of research, but I found a dress that I loved, that they would wear again, that only cost 40 bucks! That definitely relieved my guilt...
I don't feel bad considering I was able to find a shop that gave each girl 30% off their gown which was originally priced at $182.00. If it was in my budget to pay for their dresses or at least half I would, but I can't, so I did the best that I could to find them a reasonably priced gown.
Considering I've been in 3 out of my 4 bridesmaids weddings, nope I don't feel bad. I'm keeping the dress cost under $200. Which if they were going to buy a dress to attend the wedding it would probably be around the same amount. Of course if I were asking my ladies to buy a dress over $200, then I'd feel bad.
I didn't read through all the comments, so I don't know if someone's already mentioned this, but look at Macy's, Dillards, JC Penny etc. You could always just pick a color & if you don't care that they all match, let them choose individually & buy what they're comfortable with (and would want to wear again). I know how you feel- I was a BM in a wedding last year where I ended up spending $400 @ David's Bridal on my dress!! (And I wouldn't ever tell the bride, but I HATED it so it will not be reused). Good luck!
The dresses I asked my bridesmaids to buy cost $150, which isn't bad considering I spent almost $300 on a bridesmaid dress for one of their weddings last year. I think anything under 200 is reasonable, anything under 300 is do-able, anything above that is a lot to ask.
I've always been told that whatever you ask your bridesmaids to spend on dresses/airfare, you basically make up to them in lodging/ bridesmaid gifts. Which is feasible since I only have two bridesmaids, the more you have, the harder that is to do.
I ended up just purchasing the dresses that I wanted my ladies to have. It's just my sister, FSIL, and daughter. The dresses were $129 each (not including tax) from DB. My sister said that she will pay me back b/c I did so much for her wedding last year but if she doesn't, that's fine too. Since I was WAY under budget for my weddiing dress, it worked out. My wedding dress plus their 3 dresses was less than 1K from DB.
Yeah, and mine spent about $130 at Alfred Angelo as well. We took advantage of one of those mini sales they have when you order your bm dresses there (I think it was 20% off). The alfred angelo dresses were also cheaper retail at their actual store, rather than the bridal boutiques I had been looking at. Even then, it's hard to think about how much your bridesmaids will be spending on you (all the other costs like bridal shower, bachelorette party, etc etc)! Sighs...well, hopefully the idea is that when it comes their day, we will return the favor!
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I had originally wanted my girls to pick their own dresses, but after a lot of debate (and questions from my girls) they thought it would be better if I just picked something out for them to wear.
I dont mind doing this, but all the dresses I love are expensive!!! And by expensive I mean $150+. I know thats not SUPER expensive in the wedding world, but I am starting to feel bad about asking them to pay so much for one day. I know all my friends will do it, but I just feel bad about it.
Do any of yall bees know of some nice places that have inexpensive bridemaids dresses? I have already looked at places like Lulus, modcloth, etc... But some of those seem too short.
What did yall do?