To Rent or Buy The Suits?

If it's a suit, not a tux I'd say buy! That way they always have at least one nice suit.

eta: idk where you are but Jos A. Bank has bogo sales all the time!

Do your FH and his groomsmen wear suits on a regular basis? My FH wears a suit 3 times a week for church so it just made sense to purchase a new suit. I rarely like rented tuxedos, I think the look cheesy.

With Black Friday coming on the guys may be able to find a great suit on sale! Do they want light or dark gray? Here are a few nice ones from Macys, all under $150...

http://www1.macys.com/shop/product/bar-iii-light-grey-twill-slim-fit-suit?ID=529915

http://www1.macys.com/shop/product/unlisted-by-kenneth-cole-black-grid-vested-slim-fit-suit?ID=1723484&CategoryID=17788&LinkType=#fn=SUIT_STYLE%3DSuit%26PAGEINDEX%3D1%26sp%3D1%26spc%3D279%26slotId%3D4

http://www1.macys.com/shop/product/kenneth-cole-reaction-charcoal-mini-stripe-vested-slim-fit-suit?ID=2184887&CategoryID=17788&LinkType=#fn=SUIT_STYLE%3DSuit%26PAGEINDEX%3D2%26sp%3D2%26spc%3D279%26slotId%3D44

FH and I had the debate about renting tuxes or buying suits for a while. It's looking like he now is going with buying suits, which was what I was rooting for. It's becoming a pretty common thing to rent suits as the guys can keep them. Unless you are having a super fancy black tie wedding you can get away with suits instead of tuxes. Purchase and rental prices vary greatly based on location. Where are you located?

Thanks everyone!

@SwoleMates - Thank you for all of the links! My wedding is in the spring so I was leaning towards light gray. FH is a redhead and I feel like light grey would look best! But then again, grey in general is his color. Also, thank you for all the links - that was beyond helpful I really like the first one!

@RJMargo & Eb Renee, I'm in Oxford, PA which is the middle of nowhere, Amish country, Chester, County PA lol

I don't think that the guys really wear suits too often. Most of them are either retired military, active military, or police officers. But no one seems to want to wear their dress uniforms (which may be for the best since they were/are all in different branches). FH wears dress pants and a dress shirt for work everyday but does not often need to wear a suit.

Our groomsmen bought their suits at Burlington Coat Factory.

I think it would kind of depend on the groomsmen and the groom. For H - he never wears suits and neither do either of his groomsmen, most of their friends and family are already married. So they would never wear it again. It would never made sense for them to buy suits just for them to take up space in a closet. As it was we went for a more formal style anyway.

We are renting the suits, FH doesn't ware them often enough to warrant buying one, neither do our father's. The Bestman and groomsman would Ware them for work, but we want them all the same. Also we would to pay for them all, so the cost of six suits would be crazy, cheaper to rent them.

You can always think about forgoing a suit if it's not something that your FH would normally wear. I spring wedding means you have a lot more options. Just slacks and a dress shirt and add suspenders or a vest for extra class. I definitely agree that a light gray would be best for that time of year and his complexion though!

I never realized how expensive it is to rent tux's. My FH was BM in his cousins wedding in Sept and it was about $220 to RENT the tux. I was shocked. I was MOH and bought my dress for only $99! Not sure what FH will decide for his groomsmen... FH is wearing his dress blues from marines! I would lean towards buying a suit!

I too have a red head FH who wants to wear a light grey suit. I found some a while back at Jcpenny. They have some awesome sales and coupons too. They discontinued one of my favorite light grey slim fit suits but they do have a few other options. I've seen them for as low as $90 for both the jacket and pants.

My husband and his GM bought gray suits from Jos. A. Banks. He also wanted to use something they could wear again, for about the same price as a rental! They did the buy 3 get 1 free deal. The manager was awesome and honored the deal when we needed to buy them. He also gave us the 9th suit for the sale price (we had 8 GM). DH put it on his credit card, divided the cost and had his GM pay him. It came out to $212 (including tax) for each suit.

I say buy no matter if they wear suits or not. If they buy, they can always re-sale it if they really don't want a nice suit (I think every gentleman should own a suit ) . Renting is just throwing money away , not to mention it's not cheap , and the "cheap" ones really do look cheap.

You can find nice suits at Burlington , Macys or Nordstrom rack .. Even eBay (our groomsmen bought suits for $100 and some change ..they looked fine)..the grey ones were like )$150.

Also , you should just be giving guidelines like "grey suit , 2 button" and they can choose any suit they want. Trust me your pictures will be FINE. Don't be the bitchy bride that demands they rent a $200 suit they will never see again ...or even pick out a $600 suit that they must choose and must go with your brand.

We had 3 groomsmen all in different designers and you CANNOT tell in the pictures.

I really wanted them to buy suits that they could wear again for another occasion. It just seemed most practical to me. But when we spoke with the guys, they preferred renting. I guess they don't wear suits often so it doesn't matter to them? Also, when FH and I visited MW, he preferred the gray tuxedo over the gray suit anyway so I guess the rental preference works out.

If you have an outlet near you, my FH had really good luck finding an affordable suit at the Banana Republic outlet. He is pretty thin and their styles worked well. We stacked with a coupon and got an incredible deal.

DH and his guys were going to rent the suit that they chose, but have decided to buy.

My brother in law's friend just got engaged and he'll be the best man. So far that's 5 weddings he'll be in, in 2016 and 2017. I know that for the 1st two - in 2016 - he has to buy a suit for each (I'm invited to both). My BIL already has a couple of suits and only wears them to weddings and funerals, not for work. I've teased him that if he has to get a new suit, for every wedding he's in, he should switch careers.

Beach babe, that's a good point. We have two lawyers in our bp that have to wear suits to work everyday. FH lost almost 100lbs so he definitely needs a new suit. The other three guys are indifferent as to rentals or buying. The cost will be about the same whether they rent or buy. I would definitely ask the guys what they prefer. It's always good for a guy to have a suit or two for weddings and other occasions, but if you do have guys who almost never wear suits, they may prefer the rentals.

We are renting tux's. The amount we rented got FH a free suit.

My husband bought his suit, but we had the groomsmen rent theirs from Men's Wearhouse. My husband's suit was charcoal gray, and the GM suits were light gray. I think the rentals were about $175 for each guy. Personally I think most guys would rather pick out their own suit rather than being told to buy a specific one that might not be a flattering cut/style. My husband was in a wedding a few years back where he had to buy the suit. Not only did it cost over $300, it's a really horrible cut for him and just not flattering at all. We call it the Steve Harvey suit, lol.

We are renting suits from men's warehouse and we got a $100 restaurant.com gift card with 5 rentals