Registry for Long Distance Family/Friends

korenmichelle

Hi! I was wondering if anyone could suggest a gift registry that is convenient for guests who want to purchase online and ship? I am having a destination wedding and there are many family members who live outside of the area and outside of the country who cannot attend in person but will watch it broadcast online. A few have asked me about a registry and I don't have one yet. Thank you for any suggestions!

Callmefia

Pretty much ALL registries will do that. So register where you want.

I think Amazon is pretty nice for this because you can find pretty much ANYTHING on there. But also can do Kohls, Macy's, BBB, all sorts of them. I think Kohls automatically sends a purchase from the registry to the bride/groom.

mdeidre

The first poster is correct, any store that has online access such as Macy's, BB&B, Amazon, etc, will be accessible by international guests and they can have items shipped to you from the company's american warehouses so they won't have to worry about international shipping nightmares.

egm900

Some stores require the international person to use a credit card with an American billing address though (friend with out of country family had this turn into a nightmare the week of her wedding when they were trying to send gifts), so check on that before assuming that every store with a website will be accessible for your guests. 

ceh789

I'd do an Amazon registry.  They have sites dedicated to many major countries and your international guests have probably heard of them and would feel safe buying from them.

hoffse

Ditto PP about international customers and American billing addresses - FI and I have this same problem, and we haven't come up with a good solution yet.  His family is largely in Belgium and France.  His parents have told us that if those relatives want to purchase something off of our registry that they can direct his parents to pick it up for them or they can give cash - that seems like the easiest solution to us, so that's what we've decided to go with.  That said, we are planning to use most of the cash we receive to complete our registry because we have nothing that's not a hand-me-down, except that $35 set of Ikea pots and pans I bought three years ago... and yeah, they're dead.

Anyway, OP, I would see if you can figure out something like that with a close family member.  It works out for us because the only overseas guests we will be inviting is from his side of the family, and they are all actual family.

The problem with Amazon is that yes they host platforms in different countries but the products are all different.  Even going onto the UK Amazon site is sort of an adventure, but it's unlkely that your registry items will appear there.  I have heard somewhere that Bloomingdales might be able to accommodate non-US billing addresses, but I haven't investigated because there isn't one near most of our domestic guests.

hoffse

OK I've looked into the Amazon thing more.  It helps that if you have Google Chrome it will translate the pages for you.  The websites are different in each country, but you could make a small wishlist of items that will ship to the US from that country's Amazon platform - that will allow guests to ship from Amazon to the US.  You have to go to Amazon's international shipping page to tell which things won't be allowed in (video games for instance).  So that's an option as well.

Oh and Bloomingdales does require a US billing address to ship to the US.