I got married last month in the US and I initially asked my bridesmaids to just pick out whatever navy blue, knee length dresses they wanted (hopefully they would each already have one, or they could buy really cheap ones) and they could wear whatever shoes, jewelry, etc they wanted. I was trying to be easy, but everyone seemed to have a problem with it. Our moms, my DH's sister, the bridesmaids themselves, everyone made a big deal out of how I was pushing the work of choosing things onto them, and how are they supposed to know what I want, and the pictures will be ruined if one of them chooses something bad. Ugh. Eventually I found azazie.com that sells cheap bridesmaid dresses and I picked the fabric and length, then told them each to pick whatever dress style they wanted. The dresses ranged from $89-$120, which were MUCH cheaper than the $300 dress I had to buy when I was a bridesmaid. (This also seemed like a good compromise because they would all "match" but they could pick out whatever dress style looked the best for their body shape. When I was a bridesmaid the bride picked a style that looked the best on the other bridesmaids who were all overweight and busty - I looked terrible in it because it didn't flatter me at all.) Everyone seemed much happier with that 2nd option. We also didn't do the whole "professional" hair and makeup thing - we just put on our own makeup and did our hair together before the ceremony.
My bridesmaids did pay for their own attire, but the bridesmaid gifts I gave them cost essentially the same as their dresses*, and they wore shoes they already had.
My sister is the exception, because of bad planning. I told her multiple times that the dress company takes 9-12 weeks to make the dress after you order it. She did not listen and decided to finally order her dress like, 4 weeks before the wedding so the $90 dress ended up costing $300 with rush-order pricing. The dress arrived a few days before the wedding and she and my mom didn't tell me they were worried it wouldn't come in time until after it arrived.