I'm save the dates/ invites

[becks92]

Hi everyone.
1st time posting so I hope I'm doing it right.
Getting married next May and started thinking about invitations & save the dates.
Has anyone got any recommendations on where to start & what websites you've used? It's all overwhelming. I'm shocked at how expensive they can be so any tips & advice would be greatly appreciated
TIA xxxx

1st time posting & already messed the title 😂 ignore the I'm

I and many people got married before websites existed. What sort of websites are you talking about? I would just book wedding venue, tell people, then send out invitations 6 weeks beforehand.

Just send them an email of a card for those that don't have email.

Etsy has a good range for different budgets.

Many people don't bother with physical save the dates now. We got a digital save the date designed by someone on Etsy and just emailed/ messaged it to people.

Then send out the full physical invitations around 5-6 months before.

We just cobbled something together ourselves. All people care about is that they are being given accurate information on what the date is and the location.

Can't remember what website I used for save the dates but it was just a random google one. It's was free, you just saved the template that you like, and then personalise it on word and then print! I then made my own invites.

I’d recommend Greenvelope for invitations and “getting married.co.uk” for a wedding website if you want one. I used both because we wanted to go paperless and make our lives easier! Also meant we didn’t have to redo everything at great expense when Covid changed the wedding date!

If you Google when to send out wedding invitations like I did, you’ll see a lot of sites saying 6 weeks is the norm. I don’t know who those people are! Definitely not anyone who I’ve ever received a wedding invitation from! Maybe it’s an American thing? You’ll want to confirm seating plans and dietary requirements to your caterers around that point so you’ll need RSVPs in before then. I’d work backwards from those deadlines to think about when to send them out, taking into account you will inevitably need to chase some people.

I would get save the dates out as soon as you know your date, to avoid any disappointment of key people getting booked up, then aim to send invitations out with enough time to allow people a few months to think about accommodation, travel and childcare if needed - ideally around 6 months before with an RSVP date 2 months before, but no harm in sending them earlier I don’t think (I did).

Good luck and enjoy it! Wedding planning doesn’t need to be stressful - lists and diarised deadlines are your friends! And congratulations!

We have recently designed our own save the dates and invites on zazzle.com.
They have loads of templates to make it really easy and you can order samples to see the result.

It really depends what you want. I had a designer do the invites and printed with Hello Print. Don’t bother with Save the Dates, it’s a waste of paper and postage (FWIW recycled paper has a higher carbon footprint that regular paper as there are only a couple of factories in the world that have the facility to make recycled paper). If there are any key people who need to know about the date just tell them. You can always send out invitations 6 months in advance rather than 6 weeks if you’re concerned. Congratulations.

Please do not wait until 6 weeks before the date. That is ridiculous, people need a lot more time to plan. I arrange dinner with friends further in the future than that.

Can do a wedding website or paperless post or just an email for save the date.

Can also ask people to let you know if they can't make it ASAP even with a save the date.

The 6 weeks in advance was probably fine when all your guests lived in the same village and didn't travel much. It's bizarrely short for modern people who may need to make travel and accommodation arrangements.

I made mine on publisher on my computer last week.

Cost me about £3 in photocopy charges.

When I look at the ones for my first wedding they would cost loads now but didn't have Access to computers 35 years ago!!

We are doing ours on Etsy and then sending them via Whatsapp. We’ll do paper invites because paper save the dates are a waste of paper and money in our view.

May 22 or May 23 ?

I don't really see the point in formal 'Save the Dates'
Just tell people "we're getting married on Xdate. Hope you'll be able to come. Will get all the details out to you when we can"

If this is in conversation with friends (in person, in a Whatsapp, on the phone, on Zoom) then they will go "Ooh, how exciting. Tell us all about it". I presume you would have already checked with close family before booking it (and Best Man / Bridesmaid) so they will know, and, for example parents are likely to tell their siblings and so forth.

Never seen the need for 'save the dates' to be actual cards posted out to people.

I brought save the date just today! Ours is next summer 23 and some people are booking holidays for next year already so I wanted to get them out. I brought magnets from vistaprint and designed it myself, cost £28 for 50. I brought envelops from etsy as vista wanted £25 for 50 of them and got them for £7 instead. (Little tip is that I brought the magnetic postcards instead of the 'save the date' ones as they were exactly the same size but cheaper randomly.
I'm probably going to do a business card with a QR code (can get 100 for £10) and link it to a website so people can rsvp, request accomdatuon and pick their meal. All in all 100 people for about £45.

Plus another £35 (ish) on stamps (assuming a lot of the 100 will be 1/2 of a couple)

@Kite22
I get sheets of stamps for free, so didn't need to include that cost. And yes about 50 households or so. Most of them though I can hand out when I see everyone, mostly will be only be posting the ones for abroad.

I used vista print and went for magnetic save the dates.

Was actually quite cheap

@Mmmmdanone

I and many people got married before websites existed. What sort of websites are you talking about? I would just book wedding venue, tell people, then send out invitations 6 weeks beforehand.

Weddings have clearly moved on from those times. Given vendors need 6 weeks notice for numbers etc there’s no way you send invites out that late now.

And just because you had to do it without the internet doesn’t mean OP shouldn’t or should be patronised for wanting too.

We made our own save the dates but etsy have great sellers who will do deals if you get the invites too.