Weddingbee Blog

One of the funniest and most full-on “bridal” experiences I’ve had so far came from visiting a bridal expo in the early days of being engaged. And wow, was that an experience!

I should backtrack a little bit here and fill you in on a few more details—you see, after we announced our engagement, Momma Jaguar was so excited to finally have a wedding to prepare for that she took herself and my MOH, Miss K, off to experience a bridal expo that was in town while I was still in London. They had a great time exploring and had so many funny stories to tell me afterward that I knew I’d have to make it my mission to attend one as well. I made sure there was time in my whirlwind wedding-planning-extravaganza Sydney trip to stop by and visit, and Momma Jaguar quickly informed me that she wanted to come along again and make a day of it with me.

If you’ve never been to a bridal expo before, this is just a snapshot of what you can expect to experience while you’re there:

So. Many. Brides.

There are literally dozens of enthusiastic, newly engaged ladies in the building—usually escorted by their mothers or a female friend. Or two. Or seven. I’m all for people getting involved, but I swear some of the groups had their entire bridal posse there with them. You’ll see the occasional groom, though most of the time you’ll find them hiding out in the cafe or looking at the snazzy vintage wedding cars.

{Source}

Information Overload

You’ll see so many wedding-related things that you didn’t know a) existed, b) you needed, c) you wanted, or d) all of the above. Bridal expos are notoriously good at reminding you of all the things you might not have considered for your wedding yet…but they come at a price. Good for inspiration. Bad for the wallet.

I Hope These Are Recyclable

So I don’t know if this is the same for all expos, but it was one of the worst aspects of the one that I went to—the amount of flyers, papers, and brochures you’re handed is just insane. Nearly every booth or stall will try to hand you information, sometimes relevant and sometimes just filler. At first I would take any old flyer handed to me, but I soon realised I was being too polite—so I only took them from vendors that actually interested me. It saved me a lot of hassle wading through a pile later on, and it hopefully saved a few trees in the process.

I Cut My Foot Before and My Shoe Is Filling Up With Blood

Vendors will want to chat. Especially when they figure out which one of your party is “The Bride.” They mean well and most are really nice, but sometimes all you want to do is look at pretty invitations on a wall, and making small talk will make you want to run away and hide. If you’re getting tired of having to explain your wedding vision to a stranger for the five hundredth time, don’t venture too far into the booth and practice your “I’m just browsing and not really committing to anything” expression before you go. Also, bonus points go to you if you can guess where the above quote is from.

Win, Win, Win!

Oh, the competitions. I am a sucker for freebies, I’ll admit it, so I made a point of filling in every entry form I could find in the hopes that I might win something, anything, wedding related. Unfortunately, the only thing I won was a whole stack of junk e-mails that still plague me to this day…but oh well, worth a try. A word of warning? Don’t put your main e-mail down on any competition forms; use a side one. You’ll thank me later.

One day I’ll have to show you some pictures of some of the weird and wacky things we saw on our day out. It’s amazing to realise just how different we all are—and that one woman’s crazy is another woman’s bliss.

Have you ever visited a wedding expo before? What did you think of it?