HERE COME THE BRIDES : BY MAIL : Matrimonial Bliss by Fax and Phone
Planning a wedding is tough. It can be even more difficult if the bride also works full time. This was Lisa Caugherty Hahn’s problem. And, conveniently, her solution.
Hahn is director of the Shop at Home Information Center for the Direct Marketing Assn. Translation: she knows the catalogue business. Well enough, in fact, to rely on mail order for many of the items she purchased for her wedding earlier this year..
Almost all of her wedding stationery, bridal party gifts, wines, reception food and flowers were ordered through catalogues. She announced her engagement by printing the news on labels of wine bottles ordered--by mail, of course--from Windsor Vineyards. She and her husband John bought their honeymoon cruise wardrobes from catalogues. The couple even registered for wedding gifts at catalogue companies.
“Using a mail-order gift registry was one of the easiest things about the wedding, especially with family and friends scattered around the country,” Hahn says. She simply faxed her gift list to four different catalogue companies--linens at Lands’ End, kitchen appliances at Chef’s Catalog, barbecue equipment at Char-Broil, and china and crystal at Ross-Simon.
She even entrusted mail order with her perishables, such as the reception food and flowers. The wedding caterer incorporated into the reception menu the salmon rolls, filet mignons, nuts and additional cakes ordered by the bride. Calyx & Corolla furnished the flowers.
Hahn drew the line at buying a wedding gown through the mail. (Should a woman want to, however, she can order her gown from the JC Penney bridal catalogue published each January and June.)
Hahn is convinced she saved time and a great deal of money shopping by mail. Note cards she ordered for $2.50 a dozen from the Current catalogue sell for $6 at a local store. She found a reasonable facsimile of the $50 Polo shirt her husband wanted in the Lands’ End catalogue for only $19.
“I am very cost-conscious,” she says. “I found exactly what I wanted and it was less expensive, even with the shipping charges.”
