There are a lot of ways you can save money when ordering your wedding stationery. Whether you are planning your own wedding or helping out a friend, here are 10 ways to save money when ordering wedding invitations that you should find useful.
Order one per family
Often our clients forget that they only need one wedding invitation per family or couple and not one for each guest. So if your guest list is totalling around 100 people, remember that you will probably only need around 50 invitations, or even less if there are lots of families attending with children. A lot of our clients are quite relieved to find out that they only need about half the amount of invitations than they had thought and hence their wedding stationery budget is significantly reduced!
Proofread your invite
When it comes to ordering your wedding stationery, make sure you triple check the wording, fonts and colours before you finalise your order with your wedding stationery supplier. Although it makes for a good laugh when you realise that you called your mother-in-law ‘List’ instead of ‘Lisa’, it could prove to be an expensive mistake. Most good wedding stationers would agree that they are responsible for the correct spelling of the general invitation wording, but they are not responsible for any errors in names. If you proofread your wedding stationery properly, you can save money as you won’t have to re-order any items.
Combine wedding cards
Sometimes our clients think that they have to order separate wedding ceremony and wedding reception cards. Since all the information can be contained in just one card there is no need for two – again this will help you cut some costs on your wedding stationery, if you had presumed you needed a card for each.
Order extras
Once you have decided on your guest list, it is a good idea to order enough wedding stationery in one go. This is to avoid having to re-order a small print run in case you establish you need more wedding invitations later on, which is always a possibility. Just a few more wedding invitations than you need (based on your existing guest list) can save money when ordering wedding stationery as it may work out more costly if your wedding stationer has a minimum order quantity.
Take advantage of technology
Every couple wants the best for their wedding but sometimes it may not be cost-effective to order luxurious, hand-embellished wedding invitations. Digitally printed wedding stationery is always more cost-effective than hand embellished wedding stationery and can be just as pretty. Choose from our wide range of printed wedding stationery designs that can fit your wedding theme and style.
Choose digital prints
As mentioned above, printed wedding stationery is always more cost-effective but the printing costs can go up if you choose more expensive wedding stationery printing techniques such as hot foil stamping, embossing, engraving, letterpress, laser-cut, white ink etc. Whilst we do offer these printing techniques, if budget won’t allow for those, then opt for a cost-effective digitally printed design instead.
Avoid personalisation
It goes without saying that personalisation can increase your wedding stationery costs. If you want to save money on wedding stationery, don’t personalise every wedding invite. We often print wedding stationery leaving a dotted line for customers to handwrite guest names in. This not only adds a personal touch to your wedding invitation, but also saves a lot of money.
Avoid RSVP cards
While we do offer RSVP cards with our wedding stationery suites, RSVP cards are not a definite necessity with a wedding invitation. You can just leave your address, phone number or email for the guest to send an RSVP to. Some of our clients ordering wedding stationery choose not to include RSVP cards in order to avoid this additional expense. So, if you want to save money when ordering your wedding stationery, you could forget about sending RSVP cards altogether.
Minimise postage costs
Don’t underestimate the costs involved in posting wedding invitations to everybody on your guest list. Remember, if the design is over 5mm thick then it will require a large letter stamp too. You can also avoid postage costs by hand delivering as many as you can instead.
Choose your wedding stationery supplier carefully
By checking their website or social media posts you can see whether wedding stationery suppliers are careful with regards spelling and grammatical errors. If their content is littered with errors then it doesn’t bode well for your invitations! And one definite rule – NEVER approach a stationer who spells “wedding stationery” as “wedding stationary”!
Last, but not least, make sure you actually include wedding stationery in your budget when planning your wedding. We find that a lot of couples forget to include a budget for their wedding stationery at all!
Take a look at our wide range of wedding stationery here in the Studio Collection and choose a stunning wedding invitation to gather your guests in style, whatever your budget. Remember the invitation is the first glimpse that your guests will see of your day, so it really does set the tone and experience that the guests can expect at the wedding. Get in touch today to discuss your wedding stationery needs.
There’s a great guide here on Guides for Brides all about wedding invitations which may be useful for you.