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Wedding Trends
for 2004
What Brides & Grooms
Can Expect to Do & Spend
By Brides Magazine
Editorial Department
NEW YORK, Sept. 12, 2003: The American wedding has changed
over the last decade -- big-time. Once a small, homespun
affair, the wedding celebration has morphed into a major
multi-day production involving strategy sessions,
spreadsheets, and party organizers. And the price tag has
risen accordingly; a 1961 BRIDE'S Magazine article pegged the
cost of a formal wedding for 200 guests, including dinner,
champagne, a five-piece orchestra and flowers at about $3,500;
today that figure has jumped to $22,360. (CC Note: The
figures shown have not been adjusted for inflation. When
inflation is added in the average couple spends about $2500
more for a wedding today).
Not too long ago, a wedding in the U.S. was a simple
three-hour party lovingly planned by the bride's mother. The
father gave away his daughter to her new husband. The
religious service was followed by a reception hosted and paid
for by the bride's parents, mounted on a scale relative to
their means -- at home, a country club, the local American
Legion hall. There would be a few out-of-town guests, but the
majority would just drive down the road to attend. The bride
and groom were in their early 20s, and if they hadn't waited
for the wedding night to consummate their love, they most
certainly weren't telling anyone. TOP
Fast forward through the Reaganesque 1980s, when "more is
more" was a way of life. Charles and Diana's royal bash added
fuel to the fire. And as Americans continue to migrate farther
and farther away from their hometowns, most families expend
considerable time and money to watch their kin pledge their
troth. It only makes sense that weddings have become
elaborately orchestrated events.
One factor contributing to the wedding-explosion phenomenon is
the maturing of brides and grooms, both in age and
sophistication. The average altar-bound woman is 27 years old,
her fiance is 29, and both have careers and savings. 30% are
financing the wedding themselves. Another 50% are paying part
of the tab, helped by both sets of parents. And because
they're footing the bill, today's couples are planning the
type of shindig that they -- not their folks -- envision. And
it's taking more time to plan (and save money for) these
extravaganzas; engagement length has increased to 14 months
from 11 months in 1990. TOP
Women aren't marrying the boy next door anymore (couples are
meeting at college, on vacation, on the Internet), and wedding
guests must travel longer distances to attend, so the
long-weekend wedding has become increasingly popular. Whereas
a small rehearsal dinner was once the only tag-on to the main
event, weddings today incorporate several days of fun-filled
festivities including golf tournaments and spa sessions. Many
couples are also opting for destination weddings that bring
guests to exotic, faraway locales. After all, four days at a
St. Lucia resort (or on a cruise, or at Disney World, or
visiting a European capital) is more memorable than four hours
in a hotel ballroom. The stay-and-play-for-days wedding trend
is partly to make it worth the trouble for guests, and partly
for a deeper reason -- to build a community, like the bonded
group of pals the bride and groom see on Friends, and want to
create for themselves.
But despite all the hullabaloo, today's weddings have not lost
their focus and purpose. The underlying emotion has not
changed one bit, and the passion for bonding with each other
is still one of the most potent forces in our culture.
According to BRIDE'S, "Originally expressed in fairy tales,
brought to television in all its glory by Charles and Di (and
Luke and Laura), and recently fallen into the hands of dubious
heirs like The Bachelor and Joe Millionaire, nothing is dearer
to our hearts than the dream of lasting love that floats
around the rites of matrimony. However lavish and long a
celebration the couple decides on, they are taking part in a
ritual as old as time itself: creating family, expressing
hope, and affirming the power of love." TOP
Other factors contributing to the new, super-sized American
wedding
*
With 65% of altar-bound men and women living together before
marriage, anthropologists say there's no need to race off and
lose their virginity; couples are happy to spend more time
with all their guests. (CC Note: We waited to post this
article until we were able to clarify some of the
statistics. The sixty-five percent statistic notes after
engagement and references the 30-days prior to wedding. The
statistics for pre-engagement couples living together still
show co-habitation before marriage more than doubles the
chance the couple will divorce. For more information
see:
Cohabitation Before
Marriage: Good or Bad?).
*
The bigger, longer gathering is no longer exclusive for those
with fat bankrolls who can pay to fly in French chanteuses
(and guests) on a private plane. Solid middle class couples
who can't afford teams of lighting designers and event
planners are still supplementing their wedding weekends with
potluck barbecues, badminton tournaments, and
doughnuts-and-coffee brunches, designed to keep their guests
entertained for days, and to prolong their own moment in the
spotlight.
* About 41% of grooms are actively involved in planning their
nuptials. The Internet has eased the entry of men into the
once frilly, white world of wedding planning, increasing the
ability for both grooms and brides to research wedding options
and inform themselves about the realm of choices available to
them.
* Customization takes time, and all weddings today, regardless
of budget, are customized. Couples are building their own
wedding websites, hand painting aisle runners, designing the
invitations, and baking cookies decorated with their
newly-married monogram. Even simply reciting personally
written vows adds a customized element that reflects the bride
and groom as individuals. TOP
* Touches of the bride and groom's heritage are all the rage,
merging ethnic customs into the standard service to reflect
their unique families and traditions. Especially popular are
the Japanese tea ceremony and the African-American custom of
jumping the broom. Mexican couples may loop themselves
together with a lasso of ribbon. And Venezuelan couples may
sneak out of the reception without saying good-bye, since it's
considered bad luck there to have a big farewell. |
