21 Feb Tips for Handling Invitations
Handling wedding invitations is an easy part of the planning process if you know what and what not to do. Here are my tried and true tips to help guide you through the process.
Give yourself plenty of time to get your invitations ordered. You want enough time to look through samples and styles (which there are a TON of) and to gather a couple of estimates from trusted vendors, so you feel good about the investment you are about make. It’s important for your invitations to fit the style and look of your wedding. They are the first impression or glimpse of what your guests can expect from your wedding day.
Before signing off on the proofs of the invitation, response card and corresponding envelopes, recruit some extra eyes to help you proofread. Having someone else one step removed from the task of working directly with the stationer provides extra insurance that all details have truly been looked over. Usually the smallest of details are the ones that get overlooked.
Order extra invitations and envelopes. It’s pretty much guaranteed, you will forget to put someone on the list and there will be mistakes made during the addressing process. Ordering 25 – 30 extra invitations and 10 – 15% of your total invite number dedicated to extra envelopes is recommended. It cost less to order those extras with the initial order than it does to go back for a second order later.
Strongly consider sourcing the addressing out to a professional calligraphist. Not only will they be more beautiful, the stress and time saved on your part is very valuable. If your budget will not allow for a professional, ask a good friend with beautiful handwriting to help you out. A nice dinner out with their significant other is the perfect thank you for such a wonderful gift of time and talent.
Create an electronic version of your guest list… the days of pen and paper are over. You need to know exactly how many invitations to order, track who all is coming, and to be able to know who gave you what gift. Being able to share a file with your fiancé and parents to include their invitees easily is important. So get organized. Using a Google docs spreadsheet or other sharable platforms such as WeddingWire’s guest list tool make it easy to keep everyone on the same page and in one handy place.
Number your response cards. Trust me when I say, there will be those guests that return the reply card that do not write their name down or it’s so illegible that you cannot make out who it is bless their hearts). By writing, in light pencil on the back in one of the corners, the corresponding number on your list that represents that invitation, you will be able to easily solve that mystery. BAM… you’re welcome!
Stuffing takes time and patience… make sure you are ready for that. Don’t plan on sitting down and getting this process done in 30 minutes or less. Avoid exposure to anything too distracting during this exercise. This would include trying to watch The Blacklist or Scandal if you are me. You want to be able to proof the addressed envelope to the list, record that guest’s number on a corresponding response card, and put the invitation together with all enclosures in the correct order. If you can recruit some assistance with the various parts of the equation it will be an even better experience for you. And speaking of invitation and enclosure order, I have provided a nice little graphicfor you below. Again, you’re welcome!
Don’t seal anything until you have finished stuffing all the invitations and everything matched up perfectly. Trust me again on this one. It seems intuitive to go ahead and seal everything once an ensemble is complete, but sure as you do this, you will inevitably find yourself messed up in someway down the line. It happens… we get to talking and laughing and someone misses something along the way. You’ll then have to ruin some of those beautifully handwritten envelopes when you have to tear into a few of them.
Take a complete invitation set (assembled and stuffed) to the nearest post office to be accurately weighed and examined. Most invitations end up weighing just over an ounce and having the incorrect postage affixed to them is not a fun mistake. They will either be returned to you all marked up or in some cases delivered to your guests with a collection notice from their postal carrier. So embarrassing! Also, keep in mind that the postage for square invitations costs more because they will not go through the postal service machines, resulting in the need to be hand cancelled, thus the extra cost.
Stamps have become an important element to the invitation process these days. You have a few options from the US Postal Service but with most invitations requiring the two-ounce fees needed, the choices are not that stellar. Fear not, there are a few other options out there. You can order custom printed stamps through sources like Zazzle and Minted but be prepared to pay a higher per stamp fee than the going postal rates. Another option is what a lot of my brides these days are doing. They are going the route of curating vintage stamps from various sources and applying creative collages to their invites making them that much more special. A bit of advice though… if you spend the extra time scouring Etsy shops or Ebay for your stamps and have all those invitations beautifully hand-addressed, search out postal offices who will let you pay a fee to hand cancel them or better yet, allow you to take care of that yourself. What I mean here is back before machines were introduced to the postal service, every single piece of mail had to be “hand cancelled”. Basically this meant a stamp had to be applied over the postage to make it unusable again. Can you imagine using those old timey punch stamps with an adjustable date wheel on envelopes over and over? Talk about carpel tunnel syndrome. Now machines do this task but leave those ugly bar codes on everything. Definitely not what you want on your invitations.
Bonus tip… put away a couple of leftover invitation ensembles. You’ll want a keepsake for yourself (your moms will probably want one too) and make sure to give a set to your photographer on wedding day.
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