Rent vs Buy

This is what I'm going for, just with different colored ties

We had the same problem. We wanted to buy but the cost was not even comparable because we wanted a 3 piece suit. The guys are wearing grey from Mens Warehouse. They had so many options I'm surprised you couldn't find anything. Make sure you check for deals. We got $40 off each rental and a free suit for FH. Its only about $155 each GM.

We actually bought from Men's Wearhouse - it was the buy one, get one deal they have, the suit was already on sale, and buying two suits was cheaper than renting a similar style. And we went for a pretty casual suit, so I figured t would be way cheaper to rent. I was wrong! Since they are wearing white dress shirts under, our only other cost were ties and shoes. Altogether, go FH and his BM (his brother and the only one he is having stand up with him), we put out less than $500. That's 2 suits, 2 pairs of shoes, 2 ties and some fancy socks.

If you want them to wear suits, I would suggest they buy. Show your FH comparative pricing on buying vs renting. With most guys it makes more sense to buy a suit versus renting and renting a tux versus buying

@Melissa they don't have many options for navy...at least from what I can see online. We're still going to go in to a store, but I want to be prepared with back-up ideas!

@Doublej That's actually an awesome idea. I'll have to keep an eye out for sales!

@Maltese Ugh, I know. I've mentioned this to FH, but he keeps saying "there's no way you can get a nice suit for under $500+ after alterations, etc."

I wanted our guys in navy suits, too, but Men's Wearhouse didn't offer it, so they are in a dark grey now FH got navy though, because they had the deal going where if you rent 6, groom gets a free suit. Everyone also had the $ off of each, so that worked out... they do have good promotions that they run, but I agree the selection for rentals is limited.

^ It's so frustrating!! You'd think navy is a pretty common color so they'd have more!

We didn't have a bridal party, but FH bought his tux. It seems silly, b/c chances are he will never wear it again, but when am I going to wear my dress again??

Some of the pros:

1- it was exactly what he wanted--from color to fabric, it was perfect for him. He wore a navy linen tux, which was perfect for what was supposed to be a hot September day.

2-Fit-- He has "non-standard" sizing b/c he works out a lot, so getting pants in particular off-the-rack is pretty hard for him. With his own tux, he was able to get it tailored to him.

3-We didn't have to worry about picking it up/returning it in the set amount of time. It was hard enough dealing with moving all of the other wedding stuff-- it would have been a pain to have to add any more stops.

Con:

1-Really, the only con was the price. For him, it wasn't a huge deal-- we budgeted for it and he is one person, but it would have been hard to ask groomsmen to buy something specific. . .

Would it work to have your FH buy something, and then find something that the guys could rent that wasn't matchy but at least coordinated? Are the guys all in fields that require wearing a suit daily that it wouldn't be too crazy to ask them to buy something that they could wear to work?

Have you looked into theblacktux.com? It's a great new rental website that reminds me a bit of Warby Parker but for suits- they're a start up shaking up the industry and providing gorgeous suits for the same price as some of the big-name renters.

Theblacktux lets you customize basically everything (instead of just a waist size they have you submit measurements for EVERYTHING, and then you can pick among slim, regular, or wide fit) and they send the suits a week in advance so that if anything does not fit they can rush you a new size in time for the wedding. I highly recommend looking into it!

@Barbara That might work! My other concern with rentals is that they might not fit 100% perfectly. My FBIL has rented a lot of suits/tuxes recently (weddings, galas, etc.) and he said it's tough to get sizing exactly right.

@8815 looking at it now!! They have the perfect navy suit, thank you!!

We bought from Macy's. We got black Calvin Klein slim fit tuxes for around $200 each. It made sense for us because 4 of the guys are in another wedding (one of the GMs) the month after and they can re-wear them to that wedding!

My FH is wearing Navy - He rented it from a local tuxedo/suit store.

You can definitely get a nice suit for under $500. We had a wedding to go to right after ours and DH went to mens warehouse. I think he spent $600 ish, but he got two suits, a tie, two shirts, plus the alterations. It was some type of buy x get x deal, plus one of the suits happened to be one someone else ordered and never picked up, so it was really onsale. They said they have that happen a lot actually and people just need to ask about it. Unless you could show the cost of buying verse renting it might be difficult to ask the guys to buy them, especially if it's not a style they like or would wear again. We went through tuxedo junction and everything went smoothly. We ended up getting a "deal" in the mail that supposedly was sent to certain people randomly. We ended up being the tux, shoes, cuff links, shirt, pocket square, tax, and insurance, all for less than just renting the tux alone. I think everything was $118.00 total with the deal we were mailed and without it the tux alone started at $120.00. Good Luck!

My husband bought his from Mens Wearhouse. It looks very similar to your inspiration, however it was over $600 :/ Just thought I would share since it looks similar to what you're looking for.. Heres a pic of him in it for reference

I love that, Melissa!! That's exactly what I'm hoping for! The cost though...

*Sigh* this is what I want FH in too for our navy and champagne wedding. He's adamant about wearing black. Ugh. I'm letting him have it, but dang it these navy suits look so much better!

@WWkatie - I know it was so expensive!! Its a Joseph Abboud so that was part of the price. Its an extreme slim fit just so you know what suit it is.

Those navy suits are very nice. Like your said yourself if you rent those suits they will not be slim fitted like the photo. My best advise would be to look for suits on ebay or amazon that are under $100 and purchase them then have it tailored. A cheap tailored suit will rival any expensive non tailored suit.

We didn't have navy but we needed chocolate suits. Nearly impossible to rent so we bought from men's warehouse....3 piece chocolate suits for DH and 5 GMs for around $1300.00

We went rental - but that's because I wanted them in Morning Suits, and honestly, who is ever going to wear one of them again, unless you're Prince William? So we rented. $185 each guy (which we decided to pay for because that's a lot of money to spend on a suit for one day). In terms of getting a perfect fit? Never going to happen because FH and his groomsmen and my Man of Honour aren't even going to get to try them on until 2 days before the wedding. *sigh*. But for us rental was definitely the way to go.