Party invites- RSVP’s

[DaisyMama123]

Hi.
I am just looking for opinions. My child is having a birthday party and we gave the party invitations to nursery stuff to pass along to friends parents. We don’t know any of the parents due to Covid and us being busy. We handed over 20 invites and had only 3 replies so far after almost a week.

The party is in April so still a while to go. So my question is how soon do you RSVP to party invites. Immediately or closer to the date of the party? We didn’t put a RSVP by such and such date on the invites. Didn’t think it was necessary.

Assuming we don’t get more replies would I be unreasonable to send another set of invitations closer to the date again? Or would that be too pushy?

First time organising a party like that 🙃It is on the weekend, indoors and lasts 2h. Not doing at home. There are 2 more parties that my child was invited to from the nursery and we RSVP’d within 24h. But I am not British so maybe its a cultural thing. I am not sure.

I don't think it's a British thing but recently people (British or not) just don't respond and then turn up. I panic about these things as need to plan and make sure other people are invited as can't have DC sad about it and these people don't bloody help!

Well firstly, I would give a date to rsvp by because that's your cut off date.

I generally reply the evening I get the invite, because if I don't, I forget! But for my DD's birthday party in December we had a lot of no replies, but because I had given an rsvp date, I took that to mean they weren't coming, rather than trying to chase anyone up via nursery staff because they're busy enough

Not helpful I know but you've sent them out too early if it's not until April. Because it's not imminent people think oh I'll respond to that later and then end up forgetting. What was the RSVP date you put on the invites?

Sorry just seen you hadn't put a date on. In that case if send out some sort of note to say what the RSVP date is.

The lack of date won’t be helping. I always rsvp straight away or I know I’ll forget but I’ve just had the last one for DD’s party in a couple of weeks today, the deadline was tomorrow.

I try to respond within a day or two of getting the invite. Partly because I'd forget otherwise and partly because I'd hate to be waiting around for replies if it were me organising the party.

If the birthday is in April, you've sent the invitations out too early. Party inviations in our school go out around 2-3 weeks before the party, 2 is more usual. For eg I have a party to plan for the beginning of April and I haven't even booked the hall yet- I plan to do that in the next week or so. People won't book their weekends up that far in advance for a kids party.
Secondly, only around 10-15% of parents will reply in my experience, unless you know them and see them at pickup/ drop off etc and can ask them face to face a week or so before the party.

I do it straight away but people are awful for this. You will get more than 3!

is it a pay per head party or are numbers a bit more flexible? A chase for RSVPs is totally reasonable but it’s hard when you don’t have phone numbers. Maybe you could ask one of the nursery workers to remind a few at drop off?

I'd reply the day of the invite if I knew it was a definite yes or no. If I had to check on something e.g with DH, it'd probably end up being close to whenever the cutoff date was for RSVPs.

DS has started getting party invites now that he's at a big preschool. One i responded straight away as I knew we were busy and the second I waited until a week before the rsvp date because we might have had a family birthday to attend but I didn't know for sure until then. You should've put an rsvp date on the invite.

Imo You've sent the invites out way too early for a nursery party.

Sent out again 3 weeks absolute max before and put a date to rsvp by which is max 7-10 days before.

When it is nursery or primary full class parties people generally dont rsvp until close to the date until they know if their own plans. Very few people arrange their lives around nursery parties so wont commit until near the date.

There’s always a sizeable portion of no responses in my experience. Some of those still show up and some don’t. It’s weird. I usually try to reply immediately so I don’t forget.

I know we sent the invites pretty early but we had to book a venue early as we live in a small city and a lot of the places that we wanted were already booked. Another child has a birthday close my my DDs Birthday and I knew they will throw a party so didn’t want to risk it being on the same date if we leave it for to long. Luckily the other child party is a week before ours as we got an invite few days later.

its a private party so we can be flexible with the number of children but we also need to let the venue know few days in advance as they will be preparing food for a specific number of guest.

People can be so rude I think it’s awful tbh. It’s not hard to rsvp even though I appreciate the odd invite Will get lost in the bottom of the bag or the parent will read then forget. But mostly i think people are just rude.

tbh I think it’s a bit soon in advance for April as I would have no idea of my shift patterns for work that far in advance for example or plans if it’s the Easter holiday time so for future I’d say no more than 3 weeks in advance.

if you don’t get replies I don’t think it’s rude to send a reminder invite to the one’s that you haven’t heard from but if you had say ten replies I’d just go with that as it’s plenty.

can also guarantee some will turn up who never bothered replying so make extra party bags!

Non respondents are a right pain but you have sent the invitations out very early. A lot of people won't know this far ahead what they're doing in April.
Also it's half term in a lot of places this week so if they've got older kids who are off school, they may not have had a moment of head space to think about dates.
I would probably send a second round of invitations out about 3 weeks before the party.

I think handing out printed (by the sounds of it?) invites may have not helped? I would send out invites by WhatsApp these days.

I don't think it's personal at all - it can just be one of those things. I'd just send another invite or even remind some people in person, and it will gain momentum from there, a bit closer to the day.

Or ask people directly to confirm as you need to give the venue the number of people/ask about dietary requirements etc. I bet most invitees just hadn't got around to RSVPing but would love to come!

Is it in the easter holidays? as people may be waiting to make their own plans. I usually reply soon after receiving them or I forget but some people are just terrible!

It is the weekend before the easter school holiday starts which I didn’t realise as I don’t have school age children. The nursery my child attends is open all year round and they only close for 4 days during the easter weekend not the whole 2 weeks so I didn’t click that kids are off school then. I understand that some kids might be away and we did send out more invites with the assumption that some kids wont show. Well I will just have to send a reminder invite closer to the date of the party. But again 2 other parties are happening end of March and mid April and we already got an invite for those so we are not the only ones sending the invites early. Actually when we got the invite for mid April we started to look for the venue for our party😏

I’m amazed at people saying 2 or 3 weeks notice is enough. At DD’s preschool it’s been at least 6-8 weeks, more for a party near Christmas. I couldn’t get the hall I wanted with 2 months notice and not the hours I wanted at the one I ended up booking. And loads of people work weekends or have other children to liaise around.

I would follow up by WhatsApp. I've never done paper invites for this reason. At least if parents ignore your message you can see that they've read it and presumably aren't coming! Maybe there's a parent's WhatsApp group?

It's to early, you can still book the party but delay invitations. It was normal in our nursery/primary for invitations to be sent out 2 weeks before asking for a reply 1 week before the party. Less chance of people forgetting.

Unfortunately there is no WhatsApp and I don’t have parents number so I can only do paper invites. The nursery is open all day 5 days a week. Some kids attend different days or only half days I think there is around 60 kids in the preschool group altogether because they all attend different days and times. So we are only inviting 1/3 or her group. My child is there only 3 days a week herself.

An older post I know, but how many of the no RSVPs attended? I have the exact same situation as you. I only have 5 RSVPs out of 20!