Ho Van Hue Street, which is just a kilometer long, has emerged as the ‘wedding street’ for couples that are preparing for the most meaningful event in their life – a wedding party.

The street, located in Phu Nhuan District, Ho Chi Minh City, is home to over 50 shops offering various services related to a wedding party, such as wedding gown rental, make-up, wedding photography, wedding film directing, cars for hire, restaurant booking, music, and decoration.

In short, the shops can provide all kinds of services for the organization of a wedding reception, often taking place in the first two months or the second half of the year.

During the peak season, a bridal shop can receive 70 couples a day.

The package price for the organization of a wedding party offered by the shops vary from just VND10 million (US$450) to hundreds of millions of dong. (VND100 million = $4,500).

This quote excludes food, drinks, and music served and played during the party.

After the office hours of a working day in September, Tran Thanh Tin and Lam Thuy Ngoc, who reside in District 12, drove their motorbike to a shop on Ho Van Hue to find out about the price of wedding services.

The couple decided to book a package of VND12 million ($530), including bridal photos, wedding costumes for both the bride and groom, and some other services for the party.

“We two are white-collar workers and are often busy, so we decided to use a package of services at a single shop to save time,” Ngoc said.

Couples often collect information on prices and services from five or six shops before making a decision.

Some shops offer services that a couple may not hear of before, such as making a feature film to retell their love story to be screened during their wedding banquet, a bride-to-be said.

Anh Thu, the owner of a bridal shop on the street, said she has to open her store at 5:00 am on weekends, especially during the wedding season from August to March.

Her shop once organized a trip to Ho Coc Resort along the Long Hai beach, around 100km from Ho Chi Minh City, for a couple to take bridal photographs.

Some couples prefer traveling to Nha Trang and Da Lat in the central region for poetic and romantic photos. Wealthy couples even travel abroad for such wedding photographs.

Next to Thu’s shop is another owned by Tra My, who told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper that she receives around 70 couples a day, excluding telephone calls.

Her shop has 25 staff members provide consulting on beauty and dress services but couples must wait for their turn whenever they come there, she added.

My said she can only close her shop at 10:00 pm every day.

Tran Ngoc Son, the owner of a company offering wedding services, said she usually gets busy on weekends as brides and grooms tend to come in large numbers for wedding services.

Prestigious bridal shops said that they are afraid of newly-opened stores luring customers by offering very low prices and thus cheap quality.

There are some shops that have cut the quote for making a bridal photo album by 50-80 percent so a service package is then priced at no more than VND2.5 million ($110), Son said.

But the photographs are not beautiful and well-retouched of course, he added.

Another shop owner said such stores are still winning over certain clients.

Before, 3/2 Street in District 10 was named the ‘wedding street’ but Ho Van Hue has taken over the title recently.

In recent years, due to the influence of television films, couples prefer organizing their wedding parties in Japanese or Korean style, from make-up and dresses to wedding films that feature their dialogues.

Normally, the bride needs four wedding gowns and the groom has two suits for the wedding day and one day earlier to take bridal photographs.

Hiring flower-decorated cars is an important part of a wedding but a few shops cannot provide this service. Some couples want normal bridal cars, while others like classical cars or such luxury vehicles as Limousine Chrysler 3, Porsche Panamera, BMW 335i Convertible, Lexus, and others.

Other strange wedding services that bridal shops can offer include home decorations and arranging fruits on altars for VND2.7 million ($120).