I was talking to a friend today and he was grousing about a wedding he was asked to be in. He was told by the groom to go to Al's Formal Wear and measured. When he got measured, they informed him he needed to pay almost $300 on the spot for the tux. The groom never told him he would have to pay for the tux, and now he's thinking about backing out of the wedding party.

Is this a normal thing? That seems like kind of a steep, inconsiderate surprise and all around dick move to me.

Yes, that's normal. However, $300 for a rental tux seems high.

AggieT said:

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Yes, that's normal. However, $300 for a rental tux seems high.

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Apparently it's the tux, vest, shirt, tie, socks (?!), and shoes.

Yep, that's normally included. It's been many years since all of my friends got married, but I remember it being closer to $150 - $200 all in.

I think I've paid roughly $200-$250 for the weddings I've been in. Always suit though, never a tux.

Totally customary for groomsmen to pay for their own.

Friends got married. The groom bought all the groomsmen a suit from Men's Warehouse. All that the groomsmen needed to purchase was belt and the shoes.

I purchased my groomsmen suits instead of giving them some engraved gift that they probably don't want anyway. Buying suits on sale was cheaper than renting a tux and they can use them for weddings/funerals/interviews. That's how I'd want to be treated if I were a groomsman, so that's what I did.

My solution is to make myself distant enough that I'm not invited to participate in any weddings.

It is customary for the groomsmen to pay.

For my wedding, I gave a small $20 trinket for groomsman gift and covered the cost of all the tuxes. I found out right out of college that that was preferable to a flask with their initials or whatever the going gift was.

I have some friends that were all in each other's weddings around the same time. They picked a standard suit and just bought new ties for each wedding.

being a bridesmaid/groomsmen is expensive.

Do married people to be, not see the self-absorbed state that is getting married? It's begging for gifts on top of inconveniencing friends and family to come to a wedding AND spend money on clothes you'll never wear again?

Suckers.

Well, I'm the last one, so I did it for all of them, it's their turn.

swimmerbabe11 said:

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being a bridesmaid/groomsmen is expensive.

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Depends on the bride and groom.

Wife bought her two bridesmaid's dresses online about 8 months out. Couple hundred total. We picked out suit jackets and vests early enough to have them made for same cost as rental, and I bought them for my groomsmen. Jeans boots and white shirts finished it out.

Ain't gotta be the Oscars.

We all went out a bought the same tux for the first of the buddies to get married. It worked for about four weddings and then I had to buy a purple vest and tie for the last wedding. That marriage is going so well.

The rental places have a nice scam going that the groom and depending on the size of the wedding party the father of the groom might get their tux for free for bringing the rest of the party.

I was asked to be in a cousin's wedding as an usher. My tux and one of the other cousins paid close to $600 for our rental from a small shop in New Braunfels. To this day I am sure we paid for the rest of the wedding party's tuxs to be an usher.

My best friend had a destination wedding at Lake Tahoe. I told him to have a nice trip.

I asked my two best friends to fly to Vegas to be with me when I got married, so just having to buy a dress would've been getting off easy for them.

Destination weddings are the best way to weed out the riff-riff you didn't want to come but didn't want to lose relationship with them

Last time I needed a Tux, I went to Al's and bought a Tux. I just recyle it when needed.

deer corn said:

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Do married people to be, not see the self-absorbed state that is getting married? It's begging for gifts on top of inconveniencing friends and family to come to a wedding AND spend money on clothes you'll never wear again?

Suckers.

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This is my take on it. I guess I'm in the minority, but I would never do that people if it was my wedding. "I really want you to be in my wedding ... so I'm going to force you to pay $300 for the honor."

On a total aside, I really don't care for the people getting married, and the reality is they already got married, but this is the big "official" event so they can have a larger group of people give them free stuff celebrate their union.

I'm not friends with poors.

But, I did pay for the grooms, ushers and ring bearers tuxes and they each got a pint glass with their name engraved on it.

713nervy said:

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I asked my two best friends to fly to Vegas to be with me when I got married, so just having to buy a dress would've been getting off easy for them.

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Do your best friends normally not get off easily?