If you want to make sure you’re guests have the date of your wedding in their diaries as soon as possible, but you don’t want to send out the invitations to early, then Save the Dates are a great solution. They also help set the tone for things to come, so it gives your guests a little peak into what to expect.
Hannah has some great tips and ideas. I love the magnet idea! Over to Hannah…
We are inviting quite a few international guests to our wedding so we have decided to send our Save the Dates out around 8 months before the wedding. It is really up to you when you choose to send them but if it weren’t for international guests, I would have sent them out around 5 or 6 months before the wedding. As we are having a June wedding we also wanted to allow for the fact that some people might book holiday around then too.
I decided quite early on that I wanted to do a magnet for our Save the Dates as I think it’s a nice visual reminder that the wedding is coming up. You are relying that people will actually stick it on their fridge/somewhere else convenient but these days people put the date into their phone calendars anyway.
Tip: My Maid of Honour gave me a great tip that if you order your Save the Dates through Vista Print you can order the ‘business card magnets’ but still upload a photo or art work in the same way you would if you ordered one of their ‘photo magnets’. They are smaller than photo magnets (they are the size of a business card), but the photo magnets are £9.74 each or £168.49 for 40. The magnetic ‘business cards’ are £15.99 for 50. When I ordered I was also offered 50% off for buying another 50 so it works out very cost effective.
I received them recently and am very happy with them. They are thin but the photo came out as I hoped. They are great for a cost effective option.
They provide their own templates but I uploaded my own design. I got my Dad to take a photo of us but if you are having an engagement photo shoot then this could be a great time to capture a nice photo to use. This is our magnet:
What information to include?
Your Save the Date can be formal or informal depending on the style of your wedding. I chose to use just first names for ours as anybody invited to our wedding already knows who we are.
- Names of Bride and Groom (Bride first, I only found that out recently)
- Location of wedding – this can just be the town name or the venue if you wish
- Date of wedding. Including year. It might be obvious to you that it’s next year but I have heard of people sending out Save the Dates more than a year in advance.
- Wedding website address – this is a good opportunity to include your website if you are using one. I haven’t got mine ready yet so I have chosen to put ours on the wedding invitation.
- Optional extras: Time of wedding, dress code/theme
Printable Templates
If you are having paper or card save the dates, there are some great sites for free printable templates. Try:
If your budget allows for it, Etsy is also a great source of designers who either provide you with a downloadable design that you can customise yourself, or they will design a personalised Save the Date for you. Just search for ‘Save the Date’.
www.etsy.com
Email Save the Dates
Another low budget option is to send email Save the Dates, either as a regular email with an attachment, or evite is an example of a site that offers templates to send the emails through.
Pintrest Inspiration
For photo, design and execution ideas, Pinterest is a great source. If you want to get creative you can do anything for Save the Dates, from balloons, to film canisters, to personalised ice-cream tubs.
Please feel free to add your own website suggestions and tips in the comments.
– Hannah –
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