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How I Found the Cheapest Wedding Dress

By The Busy Budgeter | 17 Comments | This post may contain affiliate links

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Where I found the Cheapest Wedding Dress

This is a guest post written by my very awesome bride-to-be sister, Jennifer Daly.  I had a similarly awesome but cheap wedding that you can learn about here). 

How I bought my dream designer wedding dress for $200

Every girl wants her wedding day to be amazing. The church adorned in flowers, a perfect venue lavishly decorated, a five course dinner, and of course the most incredible dress. I will admit that my idea of the “perfect day” seems to be slightly different than everyone else’s. I absolutely want amazing. I just want “amazing” to cost significantly less than $30,000. Pretty simple right?

Planning a wedding is exciting, slightly addicting and VERY expensive. In fact even saying the word “wedding” while you’re shopping around for ideas- seems to raise the price of everything by a few thousand dollars. Weddings are a huge business. So, with that in mind, I opted for a slightly different happily ever after.

We’re heading to a beautiful New York State Park with a view that is absolutely phenomenal for our wedding. Fall colors in a natural setting where everyone is invited to enjoy a relaxed chicken barbecue cooked on site by our favorite restaurant. We are hoping for a stress free, fun day with family and friends. Still Amazing! But our amazing comes with a total anticipated cost of less than $5,000.

The one thing, I really wanted and didn’t want to compromise on was the dress. I really wanted an amazing wedding dress. But where can you find an any dress for the $200 I had budgeted, much less an amazing one? I went to Bridal Shops and tried on an array of dresses. They were beautiful, stunning, elegant, and they were also between $700-$1,500, WAY over my budget. I started to give up.

So it was time to explore some other options. I tried to shop online, but it never looks as good on you as it does on the model. I looked for an alternative evening gown that I could wear as a wedding dress, but had no luck.

And then…

A google search put me on the doorstep of St. Anthony’s Bridal- a non profit organization who works to help brides on tight budgets achieve beautiful, affordable weddings. Their mission talks about the tremendous amount of money the average Washington D.C. area bride spends on your very first day as man and wife. That’s a pretty intense way to begin the happily ever after. St Anthony’s advertises discounted wedding gowns ranging from vintage to couture. They focus on options that allow brides to have “Amazing” without the massive price tag that goes along with it. I have to tell you, I am totally on-board with this mission!

So my mom, my 10 year old future step daughter and I drive to the location, which is open Saturdays from 10 am-12 pm. St Anthonys bridal is located in Maryland, and we find the place with no problem at all (thanks to GPS!) located inside an establishment called Dogtopia.

As you walk inside there are wedding dresses everywhere – hanging on racks sorted by sizes. The woman at the front desk tells us that all dresses in the store are on sale for $150 plus when you purchase a dress you also receive a free veil. She gives us some direction as to the dressing area locations, and which type of dresses can be found in which areas and sends us into the adjoining rooms. The only request? If the dress is not for you- hang it up and return it to the rack that you found it on. Not a problem.

So we find my size and we hit the dressing rooms with 2 dresses. 10 dresses later (with many more still to go) I looked in the mirror and there it was, THE DRESS! The dress you imagine, the dress you search for- and here it is on my body! This is my dress. It wasn’t until after I left that I noticed the designer name on the tags that were still flawlessly attached. So naturally I googled it.

It turns out, that my dream day will be showcased by an Illisa by Demetrios designer dress. The online retail of these dresses are about $3,000 and their designs have been featured on the runway. Not bad for a girl on a budget.

St. Anthony’s is a non profit organization serving Washington D.C./Southern Maryland/Northern Virginia.

If you aren’t local to that area, I’m seeing quite a few similar businesses in other states. It’s worth a google search.

Try heading over to google, and typing in your state and “non profit wedding dress” to see if you have a similar store close to you.

If you live within a day’s drive of Saint Anthony’s though (or more), It’s totally worth the drive!

This post may contain affiliate links. If you click & make a purchase, I receive a small commission that helps keep the Busy Budgeter up and running. Read my full disclosure policy here.

 

 

 

 

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FTC Disclosure of Material Connection: In order for us to maintain this website, some of the links in the post above may be affiliate links. Regardless, we only recommend products or services we use personally and/or believe will add value to readers

Filed Under: Best Bargains, Budget, Budget, Cutting Costs, Save Money, Substitutions Tagged With: budget, Save Money

Comments

  1. Abiti da sposa says

    February 26 at 3:37 am

    Very wonderful experience, now i’m going to search this amazing non profit organization for my dress low cost but of high quality… Good initiative!

    Reply
  2. Dianne R. Tollett says

    July 4 at 7:51 am

    Hey Jennifer,

    Nice write up!!

    It was very interesting to read that you bought your dream dress for $200. Amazing!!

    Thanks for sharing 🙂

    Reply
  3. Abhi says

    July 18 at 5:47 am

    Hey really thanks for the writeup… U just gave an idea to choose best even when our pocket are loose… this designer dress really looks beautiful

    Reply
  4. larissa says

    September 7 at 3:39 pm

    Wow, that is really awesome! I think the dress is possibly one of the most important parts of the wedding. I think a wedding dress can change the mood and atmosphere and having the perfect dress can make the venue. Thanks for sharing!

    Reply
  5. Kaitlyn says

    November 2 at 2:41 pm

    Wow! Only $200?! What a steal for a $3000 dress! What an awesome organization! It would be great if more of these opened up all over the USA.

    Reply
    • The Busy Budgeter says

      November 3 at 12:04 pm

      $200 with the tags still on and she got a veil for free! St. Anthony’s Bridal is absolutely worth the trip 🙂
      The Busy Budgeter recently posted…Quick & Easy Turkey ReubensMy Profile

      Reply
  6. Crystal Hunter says

    December 8 at 12:54 am

    My dream is to wear a bridal gown on my wedding but the thing is in our religion gowns are not allowed but still i have planned to wear a gown for sometime to just fulfill my wish, so for that i don’t need a heavy range of gown as it is usable for only 2 hours. After reading your blog i have took the decision of purchasing dress from the non profit organization 🙂

    Reply
  7. james says

    December 9 at 1:50 am

    Hi,
    I really like what you write you are very lucky that you found a dress only for 200$ it’s very amazing and also you are again very lucky that you found that organization, and with your suggestion a lot of another girls can find there dream wedding dress on reasonable price.

    thanks for sharing.
    james recently posted…Hello world!My Profile

    Reply
  8. Olivia Bates says

    December 14 at 5:07 am

    OMG!!!
    I must say you are quite lucky. Getting a dress worth $3000 in $200.I want you to wish me luck on my wedding dress hunt 😀
    Thank you for sharing your experience 🙂
    Olivia Bates recently posted…About Jen Taylor and Wedding Planning EducatorMy Profile

    Reply
  9. McKenzie says

    April 20 at 11:18 am

    This is really awesome. Thank you so much for posting on how you landed such an awesome price!

    Reply
  10. Heather says

    June 5 at 1:49 pm

    So glad to hear you found an affordable dress. Your wedding gown doesn’t have to cost thousands in order to be the perfect one! Thanks for sharing!

    Reply
  11. Nikon Nik says

    July 26 at 9:41 am

    It’s really a fantastic article about finding cheapest wedding dress finding. These tips are so handy! Wish I had them before I got married, especially the part where I need to think about how to get into a car with a big dress.loving these wedding shots, congratulations once again! and agreed a big dress is a limited movement, even the simple activities become super hard hehe. but so worth it!

    Reply
  12. Williams Parman says

    March 10 at 5:13 am

    It was extremely an extraordinary post! This is a bit useful for me. Thanks for sharing this. I had bookmarked this for future reading.

    Reply
  13. Tanner Anderson says

    May 11 at 11:03 am

    I think it’s a great idea to get a cheaper wedding dress! Something that you need to be careful to remember however is that fact that alterations can cost a ton of money. I think one way to help you avoid that big, extra cost is by having a corset back on your dress. They can really help give your dress a customized fit.

    Reply
  14. Tanner Anderson says

    May 16 at 4:12 pm

    I love that she was able to find a dress that was $200. Even better that it was a designer gown! I think it would be great to be able to rent out designer gowns because you can get that high quality for a much cheaper price.

    Reply
    • The Busy Budgeter says

      May 18 at 12:07 pm

      Right!?! It’s insane how expensive they are!

      Reply
  15. jessica morgan says

    July 17 at 4:22 am

    its almost unbelievable that you bought a designer dress practically for free. Thanks for giving these tips and i will definitely look for those things next time i’ll go for shopping.
    thanks

    Reply

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