How much did your 16yo spend on their prom dress?

[SpongebobNoPants]

I have no idea how much these dresses cost but we’ve been asked to pay £500 towards SD’s prom outfit which seems really excessive?
Her dress alone is £500

When DP expressed some surprise (and announce to be honest) at the cost he was told everyone spends that much?
Are we just old and out of the loop or is this excessive?

@C8H10N4O2
Did you pay up?
For the trainers? Absolutely not 😂
She got the lovely things we bought her and was very happy!

I want a KitKat now 😂

DD's dress was £70 including alterations, PIL paid and allowed her to try on a couple of dresses that were over £500 they didn't seem (to me anyway) to be worth the extra £££.
No way in the world would I spend £500 on a prom dress. My wedding dress and bridesmaids outfits together including shoes and hair didn't cost that much.

@speakout

*AllTheUsernamesAreAlreadyTaken

Strangely, when I was a secondary school teacher, the girls who came from well off, middle class families would have a budget of about £60-£100. It was the poorer families who spent £300+*

What was your analysis of that information?

I was old fashioned in that I conversed with the pupils and often their parents.

Bloody hell! DD1 spent £6 on her dress in one charity shop and £10 on her shoes in another. I did her hair. The bra was the most expensive thing at £30. This was in 2014.

DD is 21 now but we spent £120 on hair, make up, nails and a spray tan. She bought her own dress for £60 from Debenhams and £20 on shoes from New Look. We could have easily afforded what ever she wanted but knew that £££ for one nights wear was ridiculous.

DS has his prom in a couple of weeks, private school, DS is wearing DH's tux jacket and short and bow tie as they're the same size and we'll get him a tux pair of trousers as he'll get plenty of wear out of them for formals over the coming few years. He's also wearing his dads v expensive work shoes as DH is no longer wearing them as doesn't go into the office anymore. I fear that if they weren't the same size DS would have expected £££ outfit but he's a v different child to DD.

DS's girlfriend had a dress shipped over from somewhere or other and is going for fittings and all sorts but she's an only and has designer bags etc already at 16.

If you just can't afford it you just can't. Your DD needs to understand that, explain to her yourself, rather than letting her DM put a negative spin on the situation.

Sorry Speakout, I misread your comment (I thought we supposed to be able to multi task!)

I’m not sure. I came from a poor background. Most people I went to school with, including my parents, were children of teen parents and lived in council/ rented properties. Huge numbers of parents living on benefits and third generation of doing so. Majority of school on FSM.

Loads would still have all the brand new, designer gear. Everyone would just get it on the never never.

Just bought DD's ball dress (she's 18, and her school would never call it a prom! It's most definitely a ball, and parents also go).

I spent £300 on a dress reduced from £600. She's wearing a pair of my shoes and I think alternations will be about £50 for the dress. Maybe a bit more if they make her a matching mask.

She's not having anyone do her hair or makeup and also she's not having paid for travel.

I was really horrified at the price in one shop we went where they were £700+. I wouldn't have spent £300 tbh but it's an amazing dress that she will wear again.

I would like to like to treat SD to her make up personally... not a joint thing, just from me.
I was thinking £40? If it’s more than that she can top it up out of her own cash haha!

I spent £500 on my wedding dress and it was Armani!
Hire a dress for £70, tons of sites around. Such a waste of money.

£80. eBay.

£300+ by time we had some alterations done and then she didn't wear it to the prom.

She knew when it was ordered that this Was first & last time I would ever spend so much on her in a posh frock, shame it didn't work out. She didn't even wear the posh heels she chose to with it.

Is it a private school @Sunbelievable? My friend went to her DS's prom at a private school. DD and her friends would have been horrified to have parents at their proms.

I made the dresses for both my DDs, we chose the silk in India a year of so before. Both of them had saved some money which we matched for shoes and hair.

All in all, cost us about £70 per daughter and my MIL treated them to extra make up as an added treat.

However we splurged on some specialised computerised light Spoke Guards for DD2's wheelchair which she can programme with patterns and images. They cost us about $300 with import tax and are still a huge hit at parties at Uni.

I'm in the US, and my four DDs spent less than that between them for their prom dresses over the years. Probably about $300 total, tops.

For footwear, they bought eveningy sandals at Target or a local thrift. DD1 bought a nice little gold evening bag at the thrift and all the others used it except DD4 whose dress was black; she bought a black one for $10.

They all got their dresses on the clearance rack in Macy's, year after year except one who bought an Asos dress online which I shortened for her myself. DD1 never wore hers again but the others have worn them to university formals.

They did their own makeup, got manicures and pedicures, and did their own hair or did hair with friends/ friends' mothers-sisters, etc.

They paid for everything themselves from earnings from part time jobs, and also all chipped in for a group limo.

To echo what a PP said about a class/income divide in budgeting - I have observed similar in my community. The people whose highest expectation of education was to graduate high school tended to go all out for prom, though ethnicity played a part too. Where I am, people with strong Italian and Greek heritage tended to do the same even if headed for university.

*I was prepared to contribute toward any dress that fit youngest DD as she has a shape that's hard to fit, but in the end her (Adriana Papelli) dress came from the clearance rack and didn't need any alterations.

@RampantIvy yes, it is. And parents have always gone, for at least the last two generations at least as some of the parents now went as students with their parents 😁 Most independent schools I know do the same. They do absolutely nothing for age 16 as barely anyone leaves then.

I like it tbh. It's a good ending to paying the fees 😁 This year because of Covid, the students can't spend the night in their boarding dorms all together though and they are really sad about that.

£500 for a prom dress 👗
I'm sorry but for something she'll wear once that's a total waste of money 💰 we
Bought my step daughters in Debenhams for about £70 with everything else that was quite enough to spend

She'll be needing a Saturday job then. I'd give her £100 towards it and if she needs her nails done, point her towards Boots.

I have twins their prom was 2016.

One dress was £30 in Debenhams sale, we bought it August 2015 as it was that seasons styles.

Other dress was £100, again Debenhams.

They had bought their own dresses for Homecoming and King of Hearts dances in high school too over the years, so had a good deal of practice at living within their means. Tickets to all of those dances were bought by the DDs themselves, and also the prom tickets, which were $50ish.

@speakout

*AllTheUsernamesAreAlreadyTaken

Strangely, when I was a secondary school teacher, the girls who came from well off, middle class families would have a budget of about £60-£100. It was the poorer families who spent £300+*

What was your analysis of that information?

Anecdotally, this appears to be quite a common phenomenon, especially in families where finishing school at the end of secondary/high school has been the norm. it's their last big school hurrah, whereas the families who expect their children to carry on with their education treat it as just another school event.

£39 dress from Urban Outfitters it was the one dd had her heart set on abs it’s perfect
£17 shoes from H&M
£1.50 necklace from Accesorize

No way would I spend those prices Its one night of teenage fun not a wedding.

@GorgeousNightingale

This thread makes me sad as I always think of the Class of 2020 kids - a whole year group who missed out on their prom and still have unworn dresses knocking around.

You are being extremely dramatic. They missed a dance, they didn't go down on the Titanic.

Our school is doing the 2020 prom in July and 2021 in September.

The head promised last year's girls they would get their prom even if it took 10 years!

£10 oxfam. Lovely dress and pretty near guarantee that no one else has the same