As I’m perusing through these wedding planning books I got (newsflash: I’m an engaged man), I can’t help but feel like I need a grand wedding. I mean, geez, all the details and options they list are staggering!
One helpful feature of one of the books is the worksheets it gives for essential stages of planning. For example, they have a budget cheat sheet that’s just spiffy. The problem is that the more I read, the more my dissatisfaction with the ideas I started with go up, but I’ve begun to I feel like I’m being had.
Call it “seeing the light.”
I initially was tipped off to this when I read the “budget” for the “example wedding” on the budget cheat sheet. It was $30,000! I know some weddings cost that much, but I wouldn’t exactly call that a “budget.” Seriously, who needs it? So I started to look through the books with a more discerning eye. I thought, “do I really need to follow all these “must dos” and “must haves?”
No.
Pretty much anything in retail depends upon customers buying. If customers are satisfied with what they have, there’s no buying. No buying=bye-bye retail industry. Thus, they spend considerable amounts of energy trying to cultivate dissatisfaction in you and me. We are never made to feel like what we have is just fine. This is marketing 101, and it is the bottom line for most retail industries.
I began to realize that though these books have some good advice and help in them, they are part of that larger marketing strategy. Strewn throughout the books are expectations, and these expectations are presented as if anyone with a caring heart, strong brain, and proper upbringing will readily assent to them. Of course, the books mention that some do things differently, but that’s just it; they are merely mentioned, then shuffled off stage. Even if the authors don’t explicitly say “you need to get thus-and-so for your wedding,” just presenting the array of options is sometimes enough to pressure the undsiscerning to spend more than needed.
So I guess all this to say that I’m learning to recognize marketing ploys and pay attention to the subtle effect they have on my emotions and mind.
