History of the wedding industry

The wedding industry has come a long way in the last couple thousand years, and has evolved from a system where women were viewed as possessions and sold as wives to the modern day billion dollar system where couples spend thousands of dollars to have their ideal of the perfect day of union. In ancient times men would capture their wives from neighboring tribes, and the marriage relationship took on a persona of the man being the victorious slave owner and the woman as the defeated enemy forced to work and bear children. Later, marriage developed into an actual industry where women were sold as wives for cattle, grain, or other valuable goods. It was not until the Roman civilization that women were allowed to choose who they married.

Marriages were also a way to secure peace and form alliances between families, tribes, or even nations. This type of marriage was known as a Marriage of state and played a heavy role in the history of the world. A prime example of this is the marriage of King Henry VIII of England to Catherine of Aragon, Spain in 1509, and this wedding formed an alliance between Spain and England. King Henry the VIII also used this alliance to invade France. Using marriage to climb the social ladder has been used throughout history and in each economic class.

The wedding industry changed an evolved in to a capitalist industry that we know today between the 1920s to 1950s, and many of our traditions today were developed during this time by advertisements and promotions from major retailers, jewelers, caterers, and many other companies.This industry is atypical of United States companies in that it is made up of many small parts, and many of them are local. There is no one major company that provides all the services for a wedding but several that generally have to be contacted, scheduled, and paid for separately; making the planning and organization of the modern wedding very complicated.

In the 1960s and 1970s brides started to deviate from the original wedding plan, and moved the wedding outside of the church. This developed the idea of the "destination wedding," and is still very popular today.

Weddings in the history of humanity and the United States have always played a major role in society, and will continue this role until society deems matrimony unnecessary.