Note that even if you have a formal set of china on your registry, no one person is going to buy all of it for you. Perhaps your aunt might buy you a single place setting (dinner plate, salad plate, cup and saucer) at $200 for the set, while your broke college friend might just get you the saucer for twenty bucks or so. So in the end you might have been gifted with most of ten place settings and would need to pay out of pocket to complete the dinner service.
Today there are very few people who want china, first because it’s a fuss, second because there’s already tons in the family they stand to inherit. Personally I can have my grandmothers, great grandmothers, and great-aunt’s china, any time I want it. I certainly would not go buying (or asking) more, seeing as how we have service for 36 already, I need it like I need a hole in my head. There’s also four sets of silver.
Our registry included practical things (sheets, coffee makers) and some random crap I would never buy like a $12 spatula (nicest. Spatula. Evar). China? Crystal? Why on earth…?
The wedding registry itself is an outdated idea, in an age where late marriage, dual-career couples, and living together before marriage is more the rule than exception. Wonder when the time will come when it’s abandoned or radically changed.
Back to the main question, what store is the registry? Whenever I’ve bought a wedding gift at Macy’s, the only stuff below thirty bucks is really mundane stuff like washcloths. If you’re poor or don’t really know the couple, shower liners or the like may be the only thing you can justify buying.
I bought my brother and sister-in-law a ladder when they got married. Why not? They needed a ladder more than good china. I don’t see a downside to asking for what you want.
Regards,
Shodan
Well, you can register at all sorts of places, including Home Depot. So you can register for the ladder as easily as you can a set of china.
They are registered at Target, Bed Bath & Beyond and Amazon.
I don’t think that registries are on their way out as so many people like receiving gifts and as others have pointed out, I suppose this is a way of getting household items that are actually needed, but it’s a hassle or expensive to pay for.
25 years ago we did the registry the way it was supposed to be done: china and crystal. Now we have a closet full of china and crystal that have been used a grand total of once in two and a half decades. I wish it was accepable then to put mundane items on the list, we could have gotten some useful presents.
When I see dull, useful items on the registry for some young couple, I smile and put that item in my cart. Smart kids deserve to be rewarded.
Some families just have an expectation that you have X number of gifts on your registry, in the $30-75 or $50-100 price range. Because you’re inviting a bunch of relatives and parents’ friends who don’t necessarily know your personal tastes, but they still will want to give a physical gift. And it can become a game of figuring out what you have both need and space in your current home.
Also if you don’t have a lot of cabinet space, or plan to move across the country in 3 years, then another set of dishes quickly becomes a liability and not an asset.
I’m an etiquette freak, and I don’t mind it. It’s practical and something they’d like to have. I like the idea of having inexpensive, useful items on a registry, and as people have said, you can always make up a gift basket out of a bunch of cheap items.