Vera Wang Backs Down From Wedding-Dress 'Try-On Fee'

China’s $57 billion wedding industry floats on ridiculous markups on everything from liquor and cigarettes to photography. But for “VIP” brides-to-be shopping at Vera Wang’s boutique in Shanghai, which is still in a soft-opening phase, one charge took the white wedding cake: The store charged 3,000 renminbi ($482) for a 90-minute, wedding-dress try-on session. That’s right: Customers were paying for the opportunity to pay for something.

Without a question the fee was high—the average monthly salary in the city is only about 4,400 renminbi. Regardless, the try-on fee is not uncommon in high-end stores in China, reported nymag.com. Such a charge helps dissuade counterfeiters and helps clear out shoppers, especially students, who just want to play dress-up. “We just wanted to make sure we were serving the right customers, and the [fee] is then redeemable off the purchase price of any gown,” a staffer told Womens Wear Daily. And let’s face it: Vera Wang never pretended to be cheap.