Bridesmaid Who Has Spent $2000 On Pre-Wedding Events Was Asked To Contribute $200 To Bridal Shower Along With 'A Small Gift'
That's the price you pay to see your friend on the happiest day of their life!
Vasil Dochinets / Shutterstock; Reddit via Canva Pro In a forum devoted to ranting about demanding brides, a woman penned a post asking for advice and input on how much it cost others to be a bridesmaid at the wedding they’ve been to.
The people of “r/bridezillas” communed to read her post and discovered the astronomical number that she had to pay out of her pocket in order to be the bridesmaid at her friend’s wedding.
She claims that she spent over $2000 to be a bridesmaid at her friend’s wedding.
“So my friend is getting married. She asked me to be a bridesmaid without really discussing how much it would cost,” she started her post, sharing what should have been the first red flag.
She goes into giving a background story for her group before getting into the nitty-gritty of the receipts, sharing “We are all around 25. Most of the bridal party is just finished grad school or just got their first job. Here is a breakdown of the costs so far. This is [the] first wedding I am in, so I don’t know if this is normal or if my friend is being too much.”
Photo: Reddit
For the bachelorette party, the bride decided to have one in Scottsdale, Arizona, and so the total price for just the party was over $1000. She added that “She also never thanked us for attending her bachelorette party and spending all that money/ using our time off.”
Next, they were asked to contribute $200 towards her bridal shower — on top of that, they were each expected to bring a small gift. She claims that the shower was “a bit over the top.”
She claims that the bridesmaids' dresses were $150 plus alterations, and similarly, if they wanted it to be professionally done, they would have to pay for hair and makeup as well as jewelry and shoes on the side.
“The hotel for the wedding and rehearsal dinner will be around $180 a night. We will need to pay for the hotel for 2 nights,” she continued explaining. “They will also expect a wedding gift from me as well.”
All in all, she claims to have spent over $2000 just to be a bridesmaid, and so she stopped by to ask, “do you typically pay over $2000 to be in a wedding? What have you paid to be a bridesmaid?”
Comments said that was too expensive, but studies show that it’s not far from the norm.
“You lost me at the Bachelorette party,” the top comment reads. “The $200 towards the shower AND a gift pushed it way over the top. $2,000+ is ridiculous.” Someone else who claimed to be a bridesmaid wrote that her costs only totaled around $450, but admitted that it was a fairly low number to pay.
Photo: Jonathan Borba / Pexels
According to a study done by Wedding Wire, the average amount to pay as a bridesmaid is $1200, “but that can quickly increase to over $1,800!”
They claim that, on average, bridesmaids spend about $208 on dresses (with alterations that can add nearly $70), about $120 on shoes and accessories, an average of $132 on professional hair and makeup, about $115 on the flight, $205 on accommodations, $800 on responsibilities such as parties and showers, and an average of $125 on the wedding gift.
Although this nears the $1700-$1800 mark, an adjustment is made since not every bridesmaid needs to spend as much on travel or variable prices for things such as lodging or even the gift, but it’s easy to see how expensive being a bridesmaid can get!
Isaac Serna-Diez is an Assistant Editor who focuses on entertainment and news, social justice, and politics.