Chicago Wedding and Bridal Blog

Some choices from the MW Tux Site

The process for finding a Tuxedo was supposed to be one of the easiest parts of planning the wedding. Just go to the MW Tux website, pick one and go to the store and reserve it right? Well not so fast. MW Tux is part of Men’s Warehouse and also associated with David’s Bridal in a lead sharing kind of way. Before we had even gotten to the point where we thought about looking for Tuxedos in Chicago, the David’s Bridal / MW Tux people had called 4 times. That is 4 times too many.

So, we were hopeful that we would be able to go visit a MW Tux store at Fox Valley Mall or the on in the full size Men’s Warehouse store outside the malllast weekend while the best man was in town from France nd get this all over with already. We weren’t so lucky.

First off it has been a long time since Steve or I had a reason to look at Tuxedos in Chicago. Neither of us work for companies that have black tie events and socially we are more of the BBQ set than the jet set. What happened to Gingiss FormalWear? And all the other places that were around when I was in High School? I am not sure when Men’s Warehouse took over the market but they have completely squashed their competitors. This is evident when looking at the MW Tux website compared with say the Savvi Formal Wear site.

Nobody even comes close to having the build your own tux functions or the colors and combinations MW Warehouse has. The Savvi Formal-wear site is a bit clunky and only has the manufacturer pictures on the site. Most of the Tuxes there are the weird odd versions not the classic modern ones we wanted and what most people rent. Fail.

Then we get to the store and the Savvi Formalwear HS kid employee pretty much attacks us to register for “only $20″. Why would we pay them money to fill out a note card that says “sales lead” on it? You have got to be kidding me. That, the mannequins falling over and the FUBU designs tuxes made sure we left without divulging any personal information. I am sure we would get about 50 calls from them if we had made that mistake.

What was annoying was that Steve and Brian didn’t seem to notice that this was a huge sales pitch for bad stuff and that they should run out of there. There were no samples of the Tuxes to try on and we couldn’t make any decisions about what looked good on them there.

Next we went to the MW Tux store location in the Fox Valley Mall. They also had no samples to try on in the store. Why is this such an issue? Don’t Tuxedo companies know that there are about 500 styles and you can’t choose one unless you actually try it on? Who wants to be at their wedding day in a Tux they don’t actually look good in?

Yes, there are a lot of weird Tuxes that can easily be chosen by accident without looking closely at the details. (long jackets, diamond shaped lapels, weird pinstripes, pleated pants, rounded lapels, peak lapels and slightly off colors like dark brown and navy blue are all in the mix, be careful what you choose) You want a 2 or 3 button Tuxedo with a notched lapel and a vest $regular tie (euro tie?). No pleats in the pants and no bow tie or cumber-bun. Those are way out of style now. All the vests come in different brocade and geometric woven patterns. The fabric is really nice and looks like the same kind you would get in a high quality tie. The range of colors are pretty much limitless.

An example of the Calvin Klein 2 button Tux with a solid black vest and euro tie. It looks like they had Ryan Seacrest model all their Tuxes.

So, we asked about 5 times before they let us try on some of the actual tuxes for sale. They weren’t the same designers as what was for rental, but at least we saw that Steve really needed a 2 button Tux rather than the 3 button styles I had been eyeing since my brother recommended that style. The sales girl was actually very helpful and suggested that we look at the super 100 summer weight fabric tuxes. If you any hint of a belly at all, a 2 button jacket style is the way to go, a 3 button jacket buckles above the belly if you have one and looks funny.

We were still disappointed though that we couldn’t also try on the entire ensemble because there was a bit of disagreement between the best man and the groom about the vest colors and ties. I suggested white, grey, silver or blacksince I have a white dress and the bridesmaids are wearing black. The flowers are purple, nobody wanted to go there. The MW Tux store had some mannequins dressed in Tuxes to look at with Ralph Lauren, Calvin Klein, Jones New York, Tommy Hilfiger designs.

Steve was ambivalent about all the colors except he liked Gold, which wasn’t a choice in the first place, because it isn’t a color in the wedding. He also said he didn’t want a white Tux, which also wasn’t a choice. This was like me asking him which chinese food he wants to order from the menu and him saying ham. All the vests were on hangers displayed on the wall, I must have knocked down a dozen with my bulky coat trying to show the guys their choices for the wedding colors.

Brian said that he did not like the lighter colors because he was a “Winter” and could not wear them. (What????) So, he liked dark grey or black vests and ties. At least there was a preference. Steve still just wanted to try the whole thing on so he could say he still didn’t know which he liked better, so we got nothing decided and went to the main Men’s Warehouse located near by.

There we found they had even less than the Fox Valley Mall store. They had a bunch of color swatches on a ring for the vests and some tuxes for sale. Hmm, they said they don’t have anything to try on either. How does anyone ever try on a Tuxedo in Chicago before they rent one? Is it possible? Do you have to do a test rental of 5 at $150 a piece and take them home to try them on finally? This is a ridiculous cost cutting move by the companies that rent tuxes to not stock samples and it is screwing up our process big time.

So, in the end we placed no orders for any Tuxes and have not decided to rent anything. We have gone back to the MW Tux site and used the tux-builder but no decisions have been made. I still feel like there isn’t any reputable choice for Tuxedo rental in Chicago besides MW Tux. They have all the right styles and a fantastic website. Why can’t they just stock some jackets, vests and ties so guys like these without any formal-wear experience can choose what they want to wear on the day they get married. Wouldn’t that help them sell more?

Any store owner that thinks that men have a clue about what style looks good on them hasn’t had any experience with these guys and may be loosing a lot of sales this way. I don’t have any recommendation about how to fix this or make it better/easier for other brides, just keep asking to try on samples and maybe one day they will decide to stock them.