I just don’t get it - Save the Date

[clartins]

I genuinely don’t get why a Save the Date card is sent for a wedding. If you’ve picked a venue and know the date surely the invitation will suffice.
Looking at some previous posts they cause confusion as recipients have assumed they’re invited all day when it turns out it’s just the evening. If we’re completely honest, regardless of receiving a Save the Date card if something better came up we’d forget the date and make our apologies. Please convince me that they’re worthwhile?

I didn't want to spend money on mine so made some save the dates on my laptop and sent them by email. They're just useful for people to be able to plan ahead - we had a summer wedding and knew some people would book holidays, so it makes sense to let everyone know the date as soon as you can. We knew where we were getting married and the date, but didn't have the time yet and all the relevant details.

I thought the same as you and didn’t really see the point of them but then we did end up sending them for our wedding - we made them and just stuck them in with Christmas cards so no extra expense really. We did them because our wedding was at Christmas (the following Christmas from when we sent the cards) so wanted to give people a bit of notice. In fairness we could equally have just said it in a phonecall/text/email ‘just a heads up we’ve booked the wedding for this date’.

To be fair I’d already checked with the people I absolutely definitely wanted there that the date was doable for them before we booked the date anyway.

So yeah, I agree they’re probably unnecessary. But we did them anyway

If people need to travel, they often want to book that even a year in advance.
It also gives people the option to not to book vacations, try to avoid booking an elective medical procedure, and that sort of thing, if they want to prioritize attending your wedding.

Save the dates aren't necessarily about you blocking anything out, it's just saying this is happening in this date. If you're also planning to do other stuff around this date and you care about coming to our wedding, wll this is when it'll be.

If you're work colleague seems a STD a year before your best friend , no one expects you to not pick your best friend.
Of you send confirmation of going to your work colleagues wedding then the weekend before your best friend invites you to coffee so you sack off thevwedding, that's rude.

I never know what I'm meant to do with them. We have received save the date invites and then the actual invitation arrives something like 3-4 weeks before the wedding. It stresses me out not knowing if I am supposed to rsvp to the save the date or if it is mega rude to send an rsvp of no when the wedding is weeks away and it'll be too late to invite someone else 🤣

@badg3r

I never know what I'm meant to do with them. We have received save the date invites and then the actual invitation arrives something like 3-4 weeks before the wedding. It stresses me out not knowing if I am supposed to rsvp to the save the date or if it is mega rude to send an rsvp of no when the wedding is weeks away and it'll be too late to invite someone else 🤣

An RSVP is not expected for a save the date. Like pp said it's just a notice to save the date if you wish. An RSVP to the invite a few weeks before is expected.

We didn’t send proper invites until we had the menu choices 2.5 months before the wedding which would have been quite short notice so sent save the dates a few months before

I hate the bloody things.

I think it is just so you can't pretend you have something else on when the actual invitation finally arrives because they have sent them out so far in advance nobody is likely to have anything on the date concerned at that time.

I never saw the point of buying even more stationery, when it’s only the key people (who you’d really miss if they weren’t there) that you need to tip off early

This ^ Plus postage, and time writing them all out, sorting addresses, posting them etc.

I totally see the point of letting people know when the date of the wedding is, once it is fixed, but you can do that by:
text
e-mail
WhatsApp
FB Messenger
or actually face to face, and them passing it on - eg, ask your Mum to tell her sister, or your Gran, etc.
(and probably lots of other social media I don't have)

So - of course it makes sense to let people know the date, but you aren't wrong in that posting out Save the Dates is OTT, and another thing created by the wedding industry to encourage you to spend money on.

Personally I would only send save the date cards if you are absolutely certain you will be inviting recipients to the whole day. We received one from DHs cousin who then decided she'd invited too.many people so we were ditched , so I dont think.they should be sent until guest list is finalised!

@Runnerduck34

Personally I would only send save the date cards if you are absolutely certain you will be inviting recipients to the whole day. We received one from DHs cousin who then decided she'd invited too.many people so we were ditched , so I dont think.they should be sent until guest list is finalised!

Totally agree. Only absolute certain all day guests