Category: Wedding Invitations

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Bridal Boutique – The First Important Stop For Your Wedding Shopping

When to Shop for a Wedding Dress After your man pops the question, the first lap for your wedding preparation begins – budgeting. Everybody contributing to the wedding kitty should sit down work on the budget to prevent nasty surprises later on. At this point choosing a bridal boutique is not yet a priority; first, agree on the budget, and wedding date. The rest can be sorted out later, following a system to keep sane all throughout the wedding preparations.When the budget is all laid out, start looking for a bridal dress. This is the second lap of your preparations and the first item to look for because a wedding dress has to be ordered six months before the wedding. Most brides choose a small bridal boutique because of the personalized service. This is understandable because during the preparations, brides are highly strung what with the whirl of activities and things to do to stage a perfect wedding.

A bridal boutique should have everything you might need – wedding invitations, crinolines, tiaras, jewelry, shoes, and the shop should offer alterations and gown cleaning if you have decided to rent a gown for yourself and your bridesmaids. The shop attendant in a small boutique also understands you don’t want to be a cookie cutter bride, so you should be in good hands.

Where to Shop

There are a number of shops catering to wedding gowns. They offer hundreds of designs from traditional to the unusual and top designer labels. There are big shops, small shops, online shops, and basement shops. You can even find some thrift shops that have wedding dresses in mint condition, which you can alter to make it truly yours.

If you have a bridal boutique in mind, check out if it has an online shop so you can leisurely view what they have for sale. Perhaps you can also catch discount offers and extra service without exorbitant fees. Check out other online bridal shops so you can compare products and rates for custom-made or rental gowns.

Whether you are shopping in a big store or a small bridal boutique, you have to make an appointment. This prepares the sales staff for your request to look at dresses within a price range; this also eliminates wasted hours in showing you dresses you are not going to get anyway.

Make Your Shopping Fast and Fun

If there are something nice you like in an online bridal boutique, visit the shop to see more of their wedding dresses. Bring a bridal magazine and the shoes with the heel height you are going to wear with the bridal dress.

Don’t be surprised that if you are a size 10 the clerk will give you a size 12 gown. This is the usual route because the wedding is 6 months away. There will be numerous fittings and alterations during the period until you get the exact fit before your wedding day.

Now you know why a bridal boutique should be your first stop for your wedding shopping.

A bridal boutique should be your one-stop shop for your wedding gown, wedding favours, wedding invitations and other essentials for you wedding. At BestForBrides.com, you’ll find everything you need, including wedding cakes.

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The Bridal Boutique of Horrors – How to Avoid It

You’ve heard of predator lenders, how about a little shop of horrors of a bridal boutique? Not that it has vampires for sales clerks and black capes and sinister gowns, but it has caused unfortunate brides headaches and regrets, not to mention the money they plunked on lousy bridal gowns. Here’s how to avoid this shop of horrors.Don’t Rush When You ShopExcited brides fall into the trap of going to a bridal boutique because they have not done their homework. They also fail to scour the area for more choices or compare prices and bam! They get the dirty end of the stick. Once stuck, there is no way out because they fear the terrible repercussions this may have on the wedding schedule.

The common cause for the error is their blind focus on the budget, not knowing that there are choices out there and they forget that not all bridal shops are equal. So they are stuck with a bridal boutique peopled with snooty or clueless sales clerks.

The ideal bridal boutique would be one that cares about how you want to look on your wedding day and gives personalized and friendly service all the time and a wedding dress specialist will guide you through the process to help you avoid costly mistakes.

How to Choose Your Bridal Shop

A wedding dress has to be bought six months before the wedding. This is to give time for time for fittings and alterations. Six months before your wedding, you never know how much weight you can gain or lose. During this time, you have to keep in touch with the bridal boutique so go for one that gives personalized service and one that is within the locality.

What to watch out for:

* Salesclerks who hurry you to make a choice
* Limited samples
* No discounts for a number of purchases
* Outdated styles

If you are shopping online, do not trust what you see on the website. Visit the store. Some bridal shops are not so honest about their merchandise so you have to see the dress to believe it is for real and available or you’re prime target for rip-off.

Hey, it’s your money so you have all the right to go to another shop. You have to deposit 50% of the total cost of the bridal dress before you can get a hold of the real thing. So do your bridal boutique hunting on weekends to avoid crowds and to have more time to do the rounds.

Shop Smart

Brides have choices of shops where to get their wedding gowns. If they have the money for a high-end designer wedding dress or one within a budget, there are appropriate shops uptown in malls, bridal boutiques, department stores, and charity shops.

It is recommended to visit the familiar or big shops as these have been in the business for years; narrow down the field until you find one that carries all brands of designer dresses and accessories and other wedding needs for convenient wedding shopping.

A one-stop shop bridal boutique saves you the trouble of dealing with numerous merchants for your bridesmaid dresses, wedding cake and invitations, and honeymoon arrangements. When everything goes smoothly, you won’t have a bag of horror stories to tell about your wedding dress to your family and friends.

A bridal boutique should also have wedding invitations and wedding favours to make your wedding shopping convenient. At BestForBrides.com you can have wonderful choices anytime.

 

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Invite Trouble With These Wedding Invitations

Wedding invitations are not just pieces of colored and embellished parchment that you send out to inform family and friends you are getting hitched. (Hopefully, for life) These speak of your personality, your preferences, and your position that affects your wedding – casual or formal, outdoors or indoors, child-friendly or adults only, all-out or budget, to name just a few. More importantly, these can result in trouble of all kinds on your wedding day when not done right the first time.Misspelled Names and Titles

Beyond social embarrassment, you will be offending your invited guests when you misspell their names and titles on their wedding invitations. To put it bluntly, you will be inviting trouble of the social faux pas kind that cannot be easily forgiven and forgotten.

To avoid this mortifying oversight, you can do research on the correct spellings of your guests’ names even if it means actually calling them up to clarify the matter. Your guests will appreciate the time and effort you exerted towards getting their names right. After all, this is not a case of a rose by any other name will smell just as sweet!

Mentioning Desired Wedding Gifts

You will run into trouble with your family and friends on this issue, not to mention running headlong into the tacky circle. Whatever you decide to print on your wedding invitations, never ever mention the desired gifts you wish to have on your wedding day even if it is a worthy donation to the homeless shelter, the cancer institute, the environmental organization and education charities of your choice.

When your wedding invitations explicitly encourage guests to bring your desired gifts, you implicitly imply that you have a “No Gift, No Entry” policy. It kind of smacks of “No ID, NO Entry”, don’t you think?

Just invite your guests to your wedding and let them decide what to bring you. Of course, you can always drop hints with your doting parents!

Map Mistakes

For destination weddings, and even for weddings where family and friends from out of state are invited, your inclusion of the wrong map cards or exclusion of travel directions will cause trouble for you and your guests. Imagine having your guest of honor arrive well after the reception simply because you gave him the wrong directions!

To avoid this oversight, always make sure that

1) you have members of the bridal party whom your invited guests can call in case they get lost;
2) you have actually traveled the suggested route in anticipation of road delays and remedies for when these happens like roadside mechanics; and
3) you have maps inserted inside the wedding invitations showing recognizable landmarks instead of aerial Google maps.

Money Trouble

There are many instances where your invitations will get you into money trouble but these two are the most notable:

1) not mentioning that the wedding reception is an “Adults Only” affair; parents are free to assume that they can bring their children thus driving your catering costs higher, among other things; and
2) not including an RSVP card, which can lead to wedding crashers brought by invited guests. There are presumptuous people in this world, if you need reminding.

In conclusion, wedding invitations are one of the first things you have to consider when planning your wedding. In fact, they are the first things to be planned since you have to send them out at least eight weeks before the wedding!

But before you get carried away with the excitement and anticipation, remember to avoid the abovementioned mistakes. After all, first impressions do last!

At BestForBride.com, you can find the perfect wedding favor of your dreams plus a wide selection of wedding dresses and wedding invitations. Visit them now and start your journey towards the perfect wedding!

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What to Look For in an Online Bridal Shop – Five Hot Tips

Tip No. 1Budget is not an issue when you start searching for a bridal shop. These shops carry a line of designer wedding gowns priced accordingly from the most expensive to the very affordable for the budget conscious bride.

Tip No. 2

Customer service should be an issue in your choice of a bridal shop. Friendly customer service makes you comfortable in picking out the wedding dress and other formal gowns for the wedding entourage. The sales people should be patient and accommodating and not bulldozer you towards expensive gowns or to their outdated selections.

Tip No. 3

Smaller shops are friendlier than those shops offering high volume merchandise. The sales people are aware that you are looking for the wedding gown of your dreams and will offer you a wide selection plus gown alteration for a fee.

Tip No. 4

A bridal shop should carry a line of wedding services. Skip the search for wedding shoes and accessories, discounted wedding invitations, wedding cakes and wedding favors, and honeymoon destinations. It is practical to get the services from the same shop where you are getting your wedding dress because you can get more discounts. You also do not have to deal with a number of shops, which can be confusing and time consuming.

Tip No. 5

The bridal shop should have a stock for the plus sized and the petite. The salesperson should be knowledgeable about body shapes and types of fabrics that would enhance your body shape.

The Best Surprises Come in Small Packages

It is a toss-up between big bridal shops and the small bridal boutique. Small bridal shops win hands down if you want personalized service. You can find this out by visiting the local bridal store in your locality or by the prompt response to your queries from online shops.

When the salespeople don’t rush you to make a purchase, you have found the shop that wants you to help fulfill your wedding fantasies. It does not matter if you buying an expensive gown or renting an affordable bridal dress, so you are better off here. With small shops, you are in the company of sales people who are after your complete satisfaction.

Surprisingly small stores carry the latest in designer gowns and offer an assortment too. These shops provide gown and accessories rentals if you decide to rent the whole kit and caboodle for you, your bridesmaids, and your mother and your mother-in-law to be. It would be fun swooping down to the shop with your family and friends for your first look-see.

Choosing your wedding gown should not be confusing if you stick to the wedding theme and your budget. With the information, the bridal shop of your choice will steer you to the appropriate gowns if you let them know what you want.

If you cannot explain the details or describe the bridal dress, it would help to have a picture of the gown, probably a cut-out from a bridal magazine, with you. The bridal shop will offer similar gowns or may have the very one thing you are looking for. Now you are ready to shop for your bridal dress.

The best bridal shop offer shopping convenience from wedding gowns to wedding favors to discount wedding invitations. Why look elsewhere when BestForBride.com has them all and at affordable prices?

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