In the Indian culture, marrying off a child is a matter of pride, and parents spare no expense to throw a traditional wedding, said wedding planner and decorator Shobha Shastry. The weddings, she said, typically range from $50,000 to $150,000 and can go as high as $300,000.
The average cost of a wedding in Massachusetts, by comparison, is closer to $30,000, according to the research company the Wedding Report Inc.
The InterContinental Hotel, the Ritz-Carlton, the Taj Boston, and the Westin in Waltham have all hosted Indian wedding expos in the past year. Hyatt Hotels Corp. developed an Indian wedding webinar to educate staff about ceremonial customs, cuisine, even popular brands of alcohol.
And India New England, a newspaper published in Waltham, has had so much demand from advertisers that it put out two wedding supplements instead of one last year and plans to do the same this year.
“Literally, this market is just exploding,’’ said publisher Upendra Mishra.
“It’s a great revenue generator,’’ said Christine Kelly, a Best Western sales director. She estimated the wedding of Tanmay and Divya Patel that Saturday brought the hotel about $11,000.
The Patels are among a growing number of young Indian-Americans holding their weddings locally instead of making the trek to India to tie the knot. There are about 1,500 Indian weddings a year in the region, according to India New England — more than double the number 10 years ago. Back then, Shastry recalls, she could find only a handful of hotels that allowed outside caterers or could deal with the logistics surrounding Hindu wedding rites such as the saptapadi, in which the bride and groom walk around a fire. “I had great difficulty in convincing some of the hotels,’’ said Shastry.
Full story: For hotels, Indian weddings are a perfect match – The Boston Globe