The Tuxedo Decision

We went with MensUSA and are getting a poly-rayon/viscose blend.  It's a little hard to navigate their website and find the vegan options, but I called 1-888-784-8872 and spoke to Liz (x224).  She set us up with a great two-button tuxedo package, including a silk-free bowtie & cummerbund.  Liz was not only helpful and confidence-inspiring, but also gave us a great discount, making MensUSA the best price I found.  We're looking at buying for not much more than the guys would have paid to rent a tux.  And they'll have a nice one that they can hang onto.  (Discounts at other places for the bulk order were not quite as steep, keeping those sites at about $250 for the package.)  Every store that I spoke with said that the poly-rayon blend is significantly nicer than the straight poly fabric, but you can also cut costs down by another $20-40 by going with straight poly.

Unfortunately MensUSA doesn't have a nonleather tux shoe option, so we will have to find those separately for the guys who don't already own tux shoes.  Info coming soon - I have emails in to confirm the 100% leather-free nature of some shoes I found.

Vegan Tuxedos & Tux Shoes

So, any rental tux will be wool.  Nick and the groomsmen will have to buy non-wool tuxedos.  I talked to someone at Jos A Bank (met him at a bridal show) who said we could special order non-wool ones, but lost his contact info.  I may start from scratch with Jos A Bank, or might start from scratch elsewhere.  Here's one option that might be vegan that I found online: http://www.tuxedosdirect.com/product/view.php?product_id=178066&category_id=007985.  This is probably the store where we'll buy the vegan tux shoes as well: http://www.tuxedosdirect.com/category/008123.shtml.  We can get the whole tux set for under $200 here, though: http://www.cheaptux.com/products/Standard-Polyester-Tuxedo-Package.html.  I have no clue how to gauge the quality of what we're dealing with, and am not sure how to tell the difference.  I don't want to make the guys spend any more money than they need to, but I don't want them to end up with junk.  We shall see.  Luckily this does not have to be decided now.  The bridesmaid dresses got ordered in time, and this shouldn't require nearly as much time to get done.