Does Modern Wedding Cost Too Much - Research Paper Example

Although there are special cases of societal icons that have broken records in spending millions of dollars in wedding events, general spending by average people has increased tremendously. This paper seeks to provide succinct evidence to support the fact that modern weddings cost too much. Interestingly, planning of wedding events has become a fully functional industry that generates millions of dollars every year. Certainly, this has been primarily caused by the increase of busy lifestyles and consequently less time to spend organizing for wedding events.

Couples have increasingly preferred to opt for wedding organizing services since there is increased money flow and less time to spend it due to busy lifestyles. Although the exact cost of holding a wedding event ranges from one country to another Sherrie claims, “The price for a wedding in the U.S, is $ 26, 400” (Sherrie 14). It is also claimed that the wedding “Cost will increase about 2.3% over already high 2005 prices” (Sherrie 13). Although these statistics were taken in 2005, it can be posited that at present, costs have actually gone up further.

There is overwhelming evidence indicating that the costs of modern wedding are actually high. According to a report by Fox, “the national average costs of using a wedding planner is approximately $3500 to $4000. For some couples, hiring a wedding planner is a crucial part of their wedding preparation” (Fox n.p). With the stresses of modern lifestyles, it is easy to understand why many couple opt for a wedding planner, it simply offers a relief. Although hiring a wedding planner increases the costs of the wedding, the relief offered is justified.

With more people preferring wedding planner service to organize their wedding events, wedding planning business continue to flourish and offer better services thereby increasing the costs further. Holding of wedding events calls for hiring of special ceremony sites that will offer the wedding a sense of uniqueness. Renting of the ceremony sites especially for the reception, assuming that appreciable number of weddings are held in church, has increased with time. This causes an increase in overall wedding costs considering that a large percentage of the wedding resources will be spent on hiring exclusive ceremony sites such as lucrative hotels and recreational centers.

According to estimates by Alliance Trust “The largest proportion of the wedding cost is spent on the hire of the venue, catering and drinks, this alone can swallow around 33% of the total cost” (Alliance Trust web). Another important aspect worth consideration, a precursor to rising wedding costs, is the upward shift in wedding age. According to Alliance Trust, “Our calculations put the average cost at ?20,000 – an onerous amount which could well explain why couples are delaying a wedding until they are more financially secure” (Alliance Trust web).

This is clear evidence that the modern society appreciates the importance of weddings to the extent that they would defer the wedding to a later date so that they could afford the increased wedding costs. A brief analysis of trends in wedding costs conducted by Wong posits, “The average price tag that is fast approaching $30,000 represents a 73 percent increase during the past 15 years” (Wong web). It is interesting to note that such a rise in spending costs can be attributed to change in lifestyle, personal