How to Sell Your Wedding Dress After Your Wedding

Many brides today are opting to sell their wedding dresses to help cover the costs of the wedding (or to afford a more expensive dress than otherwise possible). There are many ways to sell your dress and a few things you have to do in order to get the most for your dress. The biggest decisions you have to make are whether you want to sell it online or in person and whether you are going to do it yourself or have somebody else do it for you.

The Basics

Before you sell your gown anywhere, you need to have it professionally cleaned.This is a requirement for all of the options we talk about here. It only makes sense though, would you want to buy a gown that has been worn all day? Also, be prepared to not make as much money as you thought you might. The starting price for most pre-owned gowns is 50% less than you paid (not 1/2 of the retail price) and this is only the starting price, you may get less. Finally, the faster after your wedding you sell your gown the better. If you wait as long as three years, you are probably out of luck when trying to sell your gown (so get it listed relatively quickly)!

Craigslist

This is the ultimate local, do it yourself, way to sell a wedding gown. All you have to do is post a few pictures and a simple description and price of your gown and you’re on your way.
Pros: It’s generally local, prospective buyers can see the gown in person before purchasing, you get the full sale price
Cons: Small pool of interested buyers, will get lowball offers

Ebay

Selling here is similar to selling on craigslist except you may not be selling locally and potentially have a larger pool of interested brides. Good pictures and an accurate description will go a long way here. Be careful not to deceive anybody as it will only hurt you in the end.
Pros: Larger pool of potential buyers, you get most of the sale price (ebays fees are relatively low)
Cons: May have to ship your gown, gown may not sell, lots of other stuff for sale on ebay, cost to relist your gown if it doesn’t sell right away

Preownedweddingdresses.com

This is a website that’s all about selling once worn wedding gowns. They advertise which means brides will be coming to their site looking for gowns like yours. They also offer lots of guides and tools to help you sell your dress. There is a one time listing fee of $25 to use their site (which is extremely reasonable) and no commision fees of any kind.
Pros: Site is all about weddings and pre-owned dresses, small listing fee, guides provided to help you sell, listing fee covers until dress sells
Cons: Not a full service site

Local Consignment Shop

Taking your dress here is selling it the old-fashioned way (not that there is anything wrong with that!). Consignment shops sell your dress within a more traditional bridal salon feel. The staff at a consignment shop are more experienced at pricing and selling your gown than you are which may help your gown get sold faster.
Pros: Hands Off approach, since they only get a set percentage of the final sale they are motivated to sell it quickly at the highest price possible
Cons: Wedding Dress Consignment shops typically receive 50% of the sales price for the work they’ve done

However you decide to sell you dress remember to have it cleaned first and to be realistic about the selling price. Did you sell your wedding gown after your wedding? How did you sell it?

Photo Credit: dunikowski