One of the hardest things about getting married is probably the whole “money” thing. I’m a fairly practical person; when someone suggests putting down over $100 on a single piece of clothing, I immediately imagine this person frolics through fields with leprechauns throwing money in the air (I mean, it’s probably their favorite past-time). When it comes to weddings, everyone’s response to my, “Whoa buddy, I think I’d rather have food for the next few years”, is: “You only do this once!” It’s been a bit of a back and forth with my maid of honor really (who has thankfully put together a budget for me) where she says do this and I say Hey look, a dinosaur.
The above tangent leads to my next problem: Seemingly respectable stores offering discounts in exchange for personal information. I fell into the easy trap of giving my phone number to David’s Bridal because they said they would enter me into a Something with the result being a free bridesmaids dress. At the time I thought it was such a big chain store there was no way it was a scam! Well, no it wasn’t a scam (probably), but it was a very nasty way for them to target women like me looking to save money on their wedding into giving away information to scams. Luckily for me, the phone calls from scam artists offering $35k stopped after two weeks, but for some of my friends the calls went on for months.
When I first complained about the situation to some friends, I wasn’t sure who the website was that sold my information; but as soon as I mentioned the type of call, everyone exclaimed, “Oh that happened to me, did you give any information to David’s Bridal?” Yes, I had. “Oh don’t, because they must sell it to really untrustworthy advertisers, or the advertisers sell it to scam companies.” Great, once again the useless information came out first, and the information I needed came out too late.
One recent bride came forward with some very good information: Get a Google number. The number will lead to a very professional sounding voicemail which you can delete when you’ve chosen your wedding vendors. I wish I had known of such a marvelous invention before I went to all these bridal shows.
Which brings me to my next point: Everyone sells your information. Everyone. When you’re getting married, the general consensus from companies is that you are near willing to pay anything for your wedding to be perfect, and they will eat you alive for it (maybe not that drastic, sorry). Do not give anyone your phone number, and make a fake email. As with David’s Bridal, even the seemingly most respectable places will sell your information. Every bridal dress store I went to sold my information save for two places and for months I’ve gotten emails from florists and photographers I’m not interested. The bridal show I went to also sold my information to EVERY VENDOR who would pay for my email. As someone who frequents tradeshows for a living, selling my information to vendors I wasn’t interested in enough to give my information to in the first place is a very bad business practice.
My advice isn’t to avoid David’s Bridal or bridal shows, just know that they’re going to sell anything you freely give them (hell, I’ll sell my phone for you guys, I could use the cash). It’s really difficult not giving information to vendors, because you need to call them for quotes and such, so just have a fake number you give out first until you can discover who you really want to work with. And if someone calls claiming you’ve won $35K, ask for their social security number.
Wedding Apocalypse: The Trauma & Triumph 