<p>Today, a woman at my gym told me that she had taken her granddaughter shopping for a prom dress yesterday, an exhausting experience. They had gone an hour south of here to a store where you have to check in and then wait until the store has room for you. Their wait (on a Sunday mid-day) was two hours. They found what was described to be a beautiful dress which fit the young woman perfectly, except it is too long. I asked her if I could inquire how much the dress cost. She said sure, $500, and some of them were as much as $800, which did not include any alterations which could escalate the price considerably. She said some of them have trains, though this one did not. </p>
<p>Is this for real? Do people really spend that kind of $$ on a dress a teen will wear for one night? How can any of us think our children will make good financial decisions in life if we facilitate this kind of folly? (Ask me what I really think about this!)</p>
<p>$500 seems pricey to me. If I remember correctly, the prom dresses my daughter looked at were all in the $150 to $300 range. I can’t remember the price of the one she chose. But I know she bought it in an ordinary mall department store.</p>
<p>Yes it is real. Been there. I paid $400 for D’s prom dress. :eek: BUT… I only had one daughter to buy for, and I told her we were only buying ONE prom dress. If she went to more than one prom, she could re-wear it or borrow one. As it turns out, she wore it twice - her hs prom and her BF’s hs prom, plus she loaned it to a friend who wore it to another prom. And it’s in the closet, ready to be worn again. I do have to say, it is a stunningly beautiful dress - lots of embroidery, bugle beads, etc, very well made, and the material was beautiful - a shimmery peachy color that looked gold from certain angles. </p>
<p>I wasn’t that shocked by the price because a year earlier we had paid $150 + tailoring for a bridesmaid’s dress (for a relative’s wedding) that was a LOT less elaborate - a basic satin sheath with a bit of embroidery. What was even worse was paying about $150 for my son to RENT a tux for his prom. Nothing left to show for that but pictures.</p>
<p>Most prom dresses here (in “stodgy” New England) are either giant poofy Disney-Princess-esque things, or have a lot of rhinestones and embroidery - or both. Frankly, I prefer the Disney Princess look to the look that is coming in - slinky, cut-out, with prints (often animal prints) - a very sexy, nightclub look.</p>
<p>Many families here buy one of these dresses, then if the girls attend more than one prom they trade them around and borrow from each other. The people I feel bad for are those with multiple daughters. The people I think are really nuts are the ones who buy their daughters one of these dresses for every prom she attends.</p>
<p>I don’t doubt it. My D is a bargain hunter (plus we didn’t have much $ to spend) and she got her dresses off the sale/clearance rack. Her junior year she got one for $50 (had been $175) and wore it to the prom in late April. We happened to be near by the store at the end of May and went in to look around. She found a dress on clearance for $19.99. She kept looking it over wondering what was wrong with it. She tried it on and it fit perfectly - didn’t even need to hem it. Had to wait almost a year to wear it, but she received many compliments on her dress.</p>
<p>We are in the middle of the country but she knew girls who spent $300+ on their dresses. I don’t doubt those in more upscale/urban areas spend $500+. She knows some “pageant girls” and can’t believe how much they spend on their dresses - of course they justify it because of all the scholarship money they are going to win!</p>
<p>It is a little out of control, but consider that at some proms the tickets are $100 per person (or more!). Then you have the pre-prom dinner, the post-prom party, the limo, the flowers, etc. Totally nuts.</p>
<p>I’m lucky my D is perfectly happy to wear the same dress to different events, as long as it’s different from what everyone else has. Lots of kids around here also save money by having a group potluck instead of going out for dinner.</p>
<p>Prom here includes dinner. I was shocked to find out that in some areas of the country it doesn’t. It’s a sit-down dinner with dancing. D’s tickets were $60 apiece, which was the cheapest part of the evening.</p>
<p>I helped a teacher and another mom at our hs set up a prom-gown lending program. Families who no longer wanted their prom dress were asked to donate it to the program, then any girl who needed one was free to try them on and chose one she liked. We got some gorgeous gowns, and were able to help out some girls who never could have afforded these beautiful dresses. This is a fairly common thing, sometimes called a “Cinderella Project.” One high school collected donated gowns, then sold them in a big fair for $25 each and gave the money to a charity. It was hugely successful, and girls were excited to say they got their dress there.</p>
<p>One year our local HS collected unwanted prom dresses and donated them to a low income school, where most of the kids would never have a fancy dress to wear. I thought it was a great idea, hopefully they are still doing it.</p>
<p>Our district collects used dresses and gives them to girls recommended by the counselors. They have to maintain a c average, no discipline issues, etc. </p>
<p>I am one of the frugal moms (by necessity). My D went to 8 or 9 HS dances and we couldn’t afford new dresses for them all. We shopped consignment and dept store sales. She also shopped in her friends’ closets. In fact, she was given a couple dresses that she never wore - still in closet waiting for college formals. I don’t think we ever spent more than $100 for a dress. </p>
<p>But now I just have a boy in HS. Life is so easy! He went to winter formal last Saturday and I just had to buy him a new tie (on sale). His date even paid for the tickets. (It was a girl ask guy thing.)</p>
<p>My cousin spent around $300 for her dress and we all thought that was OUTRAGEOUS, she looked foolish in my opinion-- and at her school I can’t believe most of those dresses cost more than $50. I think my dress was $111, which was about the norm for my school from what I could tell, and I got it on sale for about $80. I think this kind of thing varies a lot regionally, though, I have a friend that lives in a much wealthier area than mine and I would not be surprised if her dress cost $1000+. But for me, we ate dinner at the dance, and we went to the 24 hour starbucks afterward in our formalwear for kicks and then went home for a (G rated) slumber party. So all in all it was a fairly inexpensive experience, just the cost of the dress, hair if you couldn’t do it yourself (I couldn’t), and the ticket. I am sure I spent less than $200 total.</p>
<p>I don’t even remember how much my ticket was anymore, though, maybe $60? It included a buffet style dinner, chicken fingers, mozzarella sticks, etc. Doesn’t sound like much, but it was a VERY fancy hall and we had 1000+ seniors in my class, so it would have been a little harder to pull off a major meal. We did have an extremely extravagant dessert bar. I went to my cousin’s prom with her (around here tickets come 1 a piece and it is very typical to go with friends rather than with a date, so we went as pals to each others), and since she went to a SUBSTANTIALLY smaller school they had a full sit down, 7 course family style Italian dinner. It was lots of fun, but not necessarily better than my prom-- apples and oranges. </p>
<p>I noticed at her prom that they placed all of the out-of-district guests at the same table right next to the faculty so they could keep an eye on us-- it blew my mind that they even knew I was there, a totally different world from my school-- my school didn’t have a seating chart and the administrators didn’t even know who I was, much less my out of town guest. I was glad I didn’t follow my cousin’s lead on the dress-- I re-wore the one from my dance and fit right in. Was glad to get to wear it more than once!</p>
<p>We mistakenly drove an hour to one of this type store with D2. She walked in and just froze. Imagine a grocery-store sized facility chock-ful of racks of plastic-covered dresses. If you want help you have to wait, but you are free to wander. Unfortunately the tags have only “suggested” prices, so you have no idea what the real price is. The racks are very close together and dresses are being crushed, and if they have large skirts or trains or weren’t put back on the rack correctly (hard to do considering the lack of space) they were actually being stepped on. We got the idea that a large number would be ruined in the store.
After about 20 minutes in “Barbie-h*ll” we left.
Found a lovely dress at Macys, which she had written off as an “old people’s store”.</p>
<p>Happykid normally picks up her fancy stuff for $20 or less at the second hand stores, but she found the perfect prom dress last spring at Syms for about $35 or $40, and the shoes for another $25 or $30 at DSW. She went to dinner at a local sushi place with her prom date and their friends for something like $15 each including tip, and the parents car-pooled them to the dance location. They had a wonderful time on a sensible budget. One friend even whipped together her own sarong-stye dress using several yards of fabric, a belt, and two safety pins!</p>
<p>My dress was about 150. I wore it a second time to a halloween party during college when I went as a princess. I still have it. 10 years later it closes but only at risk of breaking a few ribs. My sister found a dress that was about 500 that she loved at a quirky shop. She wound up buying the same dress on ebay used for 200, and resold it on ebay when she was done for 200. Win win.</p>
<p>My prom was an all night event in a ballroom at a fancy hotel. I think our tickets were about 40 or 50 dollars a person but we did a TON of fund raising otherwise it would have been a lot more. My class had about 500 people in it. If I remember right it started around 7, a nice sit down dinner first, dancing, a promenade with an official introduction around midnight (parents even drove out there to see you look all dolled up and take photos) it was televised in the local area for everyone else to see. I actually have a tape of it. Too bad I don’t own a vcr, lol… after that a fake casino set up as well as caricature artists. You got tickets for winning the games and put them in for prizes. prizes given out every half hour all night. top prizes got laptops, cash, stereo systems, etc. I remember my BF at the time won a suit case. It was hilarious because it turned out that his mothers company was the one who donated it. He came home with it and she was like what are you doing with that thing I just dropped it off. Lol! I remember we got about 50 pizzas at 2 or 3 AM. I believe it ended around 7 or 8 AM.</p>
<p>$75? I think about that much for senior prom.</p>
<p>D and her friends had quite a bit of fun shopping each other’s closets for dresses for other events; easy since most of the dresses are short and don’t have to be hemmed for different height girls. Lots of shoe switching too. </p>
<p>In our area prom definitely does not include dinner as part of the prom ticket. Typically groups go out to various restaurants, or less commonly, to someone’s home, and then on the the prom venue at 9 or so. Then at midnight it is off to after-prom.</p>
<p>I went to prom in 2007. My dress cost $100, but with the alterations it came out to a total of $135. </p>
<p>When I was able to I paid my mom back for the dress. I don’t feel that it was too expensive because I never spend money on myself. It was a special night and I was willing to splurge a little (to me that was splurging).</p>
<p>My kids’ hs did a dress collection project and collected over 300- everyone was amazed. I am sure some families spend a small fortune. After all, some indulge all sorts of whims. My dau discovered a few stores that mostly sell club dresses- for going dancing in clubs. Sounds wrong for a teen, but I went with her, so we avoided the risque and I made sure what she chose still had something classy about it. (Really. These were very pretty dresses.) I think we spent around $30. These were short dresses, which is what she and her friends wear to dances here and at college. I guess my point is, you can’t always judge a store by the window displays or the corner they’re located on.</p>
<p>I took oldest shopping at what is now Macy’s. She was attending with a friend who had been in her class but took a year off when he was out of the country when his dad was teaching through the Fulbright scholar program. </p>
<p>She was having trouble finding something that fit ( very petite but busty), & just for the fun of it I had her try on a pale pink sequined camisole & a tulle pale pink full skirt ( they weren’t together). They fit & I was so thrilled that they were on the sale rack ( I think her school had prom almost at the end of the year), that we got her new shoes, a wrap & even a sequined bag to match. & a tiara. she was adorable. I almost wanted to get her fairy wings I made for her when she was 4. ( everything totalled less than $200)</p>
<p>My youngest * finally* found a dress @ a BCBG outlet, I think it was knee lenght cause she was afraid of tripping. I didn’t get to see her in it, she and her friends had their nails/hair done downtown & then dinner as a group at someones home. After the dance which was at a hotel, some of the kids stayed at the hotel but D & a couple other friends decided they would rather have a sleepover at their home. I did get to see her pics though. ( although I can’t give a description of her dress, cause she took her pics with her-)</p>
<p>My D bought two full-length prom dresses. Each year, she could only find ONE dress in the entire shopping malls that even fit her (she’s petite). Both times the dresses fit her perfectly, tho I did hem one of them a bit. I can’t remember the price of either dress but am sure they were under $200 and one had a coupon for 20% off. She wore one of them later to a wedding and looked gorgeous! She had friends who wore borrowed gowns, one who got hers from a consignment shop and a range of options. Of of her friends did spend about $500, but most spent $200 or less and all looked lovely. Some shopped at bridal shops, some Macy’s, and several other places.</p>
My sister found a dress that was about 500 that she loved at a quirky shop. She wound up buying the same dress on ebay used for 200, and resold it on ebay when she was done for 200. Win win.</p>
( although I can’t give a description of her dress, cause she took her pics with her-)</p>