Wedding Dresses Ignore the Crunch

With all the media continuously talking of the economic downturn, it’s a little surprising that a recent report shows that the British bridal wear business is seeing considerable growth – far greater then the general ladies wear.

During 2008 a remarkable £128m was spent on bridal wear, leaving grooms clothing in the shade on a “tiny” £38m – the report suggested that brides spend a lot more time planning their dream wedding in their heads, even before the engagement – meaning that the dream wedding dress had been purchased in the bride’s mind some time before the almighty credit crunch, and simply won’t compromise.

Top end retailers of bridal wear, where wedding dresses sell from around £2,000 to prices most people can’t imagine, say their businesses are growing year on year, and most brides to be are simply not very price conscious.

Another report by Bridal Buyer magazine, conducted further research from brides and found that ladies who were planning to reduce the overall cost of their wedding day, were making cut backs elsewhere. Rather then opting for a less expensive wedding dress, they were cutting back on the wedding guest count, or reducing the amount spent on smaller items such as wedding favours.

Other wedding trends are emerging from the study, such as the return of the ballroom style, multi layered, romantic wedding dress, with it’s fairytale wedding look.
And with the 2008 wedding dress market valued at £220m – 2009 looks likely to brush aside any concern for the recession and continue to produce delightful high quality wedding dresses for many brides again this year.

Is the credit crunch having an effect on your wedding planning ? Take part in our poll on the right hand side of this article.

Happy Wedding Planning !

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