Are Bridal showers necessary?

Often a bridal shower is when people find out about your wedding registry. A bachelorette party is often your “last hurrah” as a single woman. I consider it though a celebration with my bridesmaids and a few other people. The bridal shower a celebration with family and close friends.

A bridal shower is meant to shower the bride with gifts and is often a more family based celebration, many women look forward to attending them, it's often only meant for those in driving distance. Is it needed? No. But maybe you compromise on a nice lunch or dinner with the local people.
Bachelorette parties are often seen as the last night you can have a wild party. Which as we all know isn't always true. I'd say it's more like a celebration with the bridal party to have fun together before the big day. Is that needed? Nope!
Do what you like if that isn't parties then it isn't parties.

I had both
It was fun! It's like another event where you see your friends and get to celebrate you.
It's def not necessary though so you could skip out on them

ALL of my fmaily/friends live in another state, but my FMIL and FSIL really want to host a bridal shower. I as well see no point in it. I know my wedding planning is super low key compared to what my FMIL is used. For her other two kid's (a son and daughter) weddings she was VERY involved with the planning and the "doing"... whereas my FH and I picked a venue where almost everything is taken care of for us. Allowing her to host a bridal shower was something she could have charge over and plan.. a lot of advice I received from people was to give the FMIL an event/task and let them do it 100%.. this is her thing.

Someone said to me a bridal shower is like the only time in your adult life that something is going to be all about you. You get to pick out gifts that you want and you get to have women celebrate you. Yea sure you'll have birthdays, but that's not the same. If you have children you get a baby shower, but that's about the baby. Let people celebrate you! If they can't make it then they can't make it so have something small. It seems like it might be important to your mom also.

Bachelorette party, I don't really see the point. FH went to a big weekend bachelor party and it just felt like really your celebrating his "bachelor hood" he's been with his now wife for over 10 years, they own a home, he stopped being a "bachelor" a long time ago. So not really my thing and just an added expense that some people might not be able to afford, but feel obligated to attend.

I didn't plan on a shower, but my mom wanted to throw me one. I'm happy she did, it was a nice event to see the women invited prior and to introduce some guests to the others. Plus the gifts are obviously exciting! And it just made me get into the wedding spirit. My bachelorette party was SO fun and I would be so bummed if I didn't have one. 6 out of my 9 bridesmaids went, and everyone had an amazing time. They all liked bonding & meeting prior to the wedding too.

My mom offered to throw me/us a shower or gathering of our choosing. To me, bridal showers always feel like a kind of forced and awkward double-dipping of gifts, so we decided on an engagement party instead. We did a super low key gathering of all our friends at a local brewery with snacks to celebrate that we were officially engaged. I'm planning to do some kind of bachelorette party as well, but it'll probably just be bar hopping with all my local friends - something low key where all my girl friends can hang out together.

Definitely not necessary. If you don’t want them, don’t have them.

Totally up to you! I don't want one at all but both FMIL and my mom are insisting on having one. So im just doing it for them

With the technology age, bridal showers have become less necessary. I really think the main point these days to cut down on gifts you have to find some way to transport on the day of. Since I don't have a lot of local family/female friends who would want to come, this doesn't seem all that important to me. If you do have those people, it might not be a bad idea to let them dote on you for a day.

For bachelorette party, however, is important, though perhaps not absolutely necessary. It is a celebration of the girls you have chosen and it can be planned super close to your wedding to include out of town guests so that you get more face time with them. It doesn't have to be your traditional party. I'm doing dinner & board games with my girls. It will likely be the first and last time they are all in the same room (outside of the wedding, of course).

If your bridesmaids already know each other and hang out regularly, its not nearly as big of a deal. For me, all 3 of my bridesmaids are from very different times in my life. 2 of the 3 live across the country. Since my girls don't know each other and likely won't be near each other before or after my wedding week, I felt that having one party with all of them would be very special. It is also a really good excuse to spend more time with them since they aren't generally around. Because of the laid back nature of it, I might even invite their husbands whom are also my good friends.

I suppose setting aside one evening to spend with your wedding party and possibly significant others is what is important more than what you term it as. It gives you a chance to slow down and enjoy the people you've chosen to stand with you, even in the middle of crazy last minute planning time.

Neither is necessary, and no need to have them if you don’t want them.

I had both, but very tiny versions of each. My shower was a small gathering at my parents’ house and I loved it just to get time to spend with people I don’t get to see very often, and even though they were at my wedding, I didn’t get the “quality time” with anyone that day like I did at my shower. In my case, the shower was a real advantage strictly as an opportunity for some of my cousins to meet my husband for the first time and get to know “us” as a couple, which was nice (I have a HUGE family that I don’t live near). If it would’ve been a gathering of the same people we hang out with all the time, I probably wouldn’t have been so inclined. Also, if we didn’t want gifts. While we did have a home together, we combined households with a lot of mismatched stuff, so were excited to register for new, adulty, complete set style upgrades for the house. But, a lot of people these days are fully stocked and aren’t looking for that— if we were in that boat, we would’ve skipped a shower.

As far as the Bach party, I wasn’t looking for anything crazy or wild clubbing type thing. I had a nice quiet weekend with only my 3 very best friends (my whole bridal party). This again is totally optional. For us, it was a beach day, a really nice brunch, and a visit to a brewery and a couple wineries. It was a lovely mental recharge for me (the weekend before the wedding, so an absolutely break from planning). If you want it, it can be whatever you want. But it’s also totally not necessary if it’s not something you want !

Bridal Shower: No, it's more of a if someone throws it for you, great. If not, you don't have one. It's a really fun day to play games and celebrate your future marriage but it is also a gift giving event so it si not recommended to throw it yourself. I wanted to throw one originally before I learned that but let it go until I found out my mom and sister are in planning mode haha

Bachelorette party: also typically planned by the girls in the wedding party BUT can be planned by you if you are more comfortable doing so. My coworker planned a day of relaxation in Palm Springs for her and her girls; I am planning a Disney trip so I can wear my minnie mouse veil lol. Whatever you want works!

I also wanted to add that celebrating the engagement by having an engagement party is always an option. It's a fun way to just celebrate with all of your closest friends and family over dinner or any other fun setting.

We didn't have a shower at all. I really hated the idea of a party at which the chief entertainment was giving me gifts. And I also intensely dislike single sex parties.

We had two bachelorettes: one a games night at Dave & Buster's, and one at a Korean bathhouse. But those weren't necessary; if you'd prefer to do without, that's fine.

I want both. That being said, I only plan on inviting the local people to the bridal shower. So mostly just my local family and bridal party. Plus whoever his mom/aunts decide need invited.

For the bachlorette, I'm only planning on inviting a handful of guests who are my age. My sorority sisters and bridal party only.

The bridal shower isnt my scene, but my and his older relatives love those sorts of events.

The bachlorette is for me. Just to have some time to celebrate and relax with some of my favorites.

I'm not having either, technically. Definitely not having a shower (by my request). The bachelorette/bachelor party thing is so very silly to me - I'm not single, he's not single. However, my friends and such wanted to get together and so I will. Same for him, though his will be a trip overnight or a weekend. The last one his friends had they went white water rafting. I struggle with all of this stuff because I honestly see it as just more excuses to waste money and find reasons to throw a party. Not judging, just happen to be in the minority when it comes to social norms. 😂