Reagan Walker
Cox News Service

Venus is interested in fine china, some nice table linens and elegant serving dishes. Mars wants proper barware, a power drill and a Weed Eater.

There was a time when the bride-to-be took care of the wedding-gift registries without any input (or interference) from her betrothed. But these days, when it comes to picking out the gifts - and making many other wedding plans - here comes the groom.

Grooms like Andy Williams, Tim Veil and Scott Rials: Williams, 25, registered for tools; Veil, 26, set up a nuptials Web site, hired a videographer and insisted the gift list include bar ware; and Rials, 32, is producing a video for the rehearsal dinner and has some pretty specific ideas about the groom’s cake (perhaps something in the shape of a Labrador.)

It’s hard to stop there, admits Rials, the executive director of the Georgia Republican Party. "As a person who is in politics - who is used to being in charge of big events - it’s difficult for me to let go," Rials said. "But it’s a practice in compromise that I’m trying to get used to."

The trend of grooms flexing their altar ego is being credited by wedding experts to two factors: Couples are getting married at an older age, and they are often footing some, if not all, of the wedding bill.

Retailers nationally are taking note and working to attract both partners in the roughly 2.5 million marriages each year. Stores not traditionally a part of the $17 billion wedding-gift industry, like hardware sellers, are promoting gift registries. And stores with longstanding registries are luring grooms with new technology - namely scanner guns that allow them to roam the store and zap the product codes of items they want.

"The scanner has totally changed the amount of interest that guys have in the registry process," said Michael Lee, manager of a Crate & Barrel in Atlanta. "It’s kind of like channel-surfing with the TV remote."

Williams admitted he got hooked on the scanner at Crate & Barrel. "I didn’t really care about the silverware or the plates, but I did take the gun and scan some things that caught my eye, like beer mugs," said Williams, who was married last weekend to Kim Jordan.

And once he was done at the housewares stores, Williams set out on his own to create a wish list at Home Depot in anticipation of buying a home. Some of his friends took the cue and threw him a tool shower.

"I got a drill, a saw, a toolbox, wrenches, an electric screwdriver - all the standard stuff you need to repair stuff," he said.

Not exactly the kind of stuff brides dream of. "But people are waiting to get married, and some are in their second marriages, so they’ve already had time to accumulate plenty of tabletop items," said Mandy Holton, spokeswoman for Home Depot. "So we see them registering for edgers, blowers, trimmers, grills, power drills and ceiling fans."

The median age for first marriages has inched up three years in the past two decades, to 27 for grooms and 25 for brides, according to the U.S. Census. That means both brides and grooms have had time to live on their own, accumulate household items and develop their own sense of style. (This is even more the case with second and third marriages.)

Older couples also are more established in their careers and therefore able to help pay for the wedding. A recent survey by Bridal Guide magazine showed that 82 percent of couples will pick up some or all of the tab.

"Because the grooms are involved in writing the checks, they are taking a greater interest," said Diane Forden, Bridal Guide’s editor-in-chief. "Grooms today are still leaving the dress, bridesmaids, flowers and that sort of thing to the bride, but they are very involved in planning the type of wedding, selecting the music and menu and the site, setting up Web sites and registering for the gifts."

Matilda Dobbs, who handles the wedding registry at Tiffany & Co. in Atlanta, concurs. "You can go back not too many years, and the grooms were never involved in registering," said Dobbs, who’s worked in the wedding industry for 27 years. "Now, most of the time brides make an appointment with me when the grooms can accompany them."

That’s inevitably changing the kinds of gifts on registries (now often referred to as wedding registries rather than bridal registries.) Forden said furniture, electronics and hardware are moving up on her magazine’s annual gift registry survey while china and silver are sliding.

Barware, cookware, knives and small appliances also do well with the fellas. "The linen and china don’t entrance them as much," said Bette Kahn, spokesperson for Crate & Barrel, "but we do hear them discussing whether a skillet will be good for fried eggs and French toast."

Veil said he was drawn to barware and "definitely wanted a decent set of steak knives." He and his fiancee, Lisa Brown, went to a special event at Crate & Barrel that allowed couples to come in on a Sunday morning before regular store hours and register with the scanners while sipping on mimosas. "The zapper gun was definitely my favorite part," he said. (Williams Sonoma and Target also use scanners.)

Brown said the zapper changed the dynamics of the conversation for the couple. "He had accused me of going overboard and registering for too much until he got the scanner in his hand," she said. "Then he showed a lot of interest. He was very adamant about some things, including registering for the double old fashioned glasses."

Rials also took control of the scanner gun when registering with his fiancee, Katie Ruehl.

But he said he tried to follow a bit of advice given to him by Gov. Sonny Perdue: "Whatever she likes is wonderful and beautiful."

On the few occasions when either Ruehl or Rials picked an item the other didn’t like all that much, he said: "We didn’t argue over it, we just zapped it."