Hello dear!

We’re so grateful for all your love & likes! We couldn’t be happier that you’re here with us today! 🙂

Every bride & groom these days, do send out a Save the Date for their wedding!
It’s almost like a “MUST DO” given today’s social commitments!

But you may wonder – Where do I begin?

You may have loads of questions / doubts! We too, very often get asked some of these!

– How early should I send them out?
– What information do I need to put on them?
– Do I need to have my wedding logo on it?

So on & so forth…

If you’re in a similar fix, then this blog post is here to answer all those questions… & not only that – we also draw your attention to some areas, where brides & grooms tend to miss out on!

Nonetheless, because there is a so-called ‘etiquette’ expected, it does NOT mean that you need to do things in that same way.

So, please take the below as a guide for NOT the only way to do things.

Also do visit our ‘Etsy Shop‘ for DIY Save the dates, Invitations & Stationery Templates that are available for quick edits and instant downloads:

Please click here : https://www.etsy.com/in-en/shop/CustomizingDIY

Ok, here we go…

1) Sending them too early or too late

Most of the times, once the dates or venues are confirmed, couples are always in a rush to send their Save the Date. And this is very natural!

Whether you’re sending printed copies or E-versions, it is of crucial importance to get the timing right – especially if your wedding date is a very auspicious / popular one, with too many weddings taking place in and around the same day.

8-10 months prior to the wedding date is perfect for a home city wedding.

10-12 months in prior is ideal for destination weddings.

If you send it way too much in advance, your guests may tend to forget your dates.

Sending out your Save the Date way too late, will lose its charm – there are high chances that some of your guests may have already committed to other travels or weddings.

2) Waiting to decide your wedding monogram / logo

Like we mentioned above, most families want to send out the Save the Date as soon as the dates & venues are confirmed.

The downside of this is that, you may not have enough time to think through or look at enough options for the wedding monogram / logo – at this point in time, all you want to ideally do is, get the Save the Date out!

There is no rule or compulsion that your logo or monogram HAS to come in your Save the Date. Even without it, the design can look really pretty & complete.

Take a look at the example below :

The monogram or logo can totally wait until you are super happy with it – & it can be the BIG REVEAL in your wedding card.

You can also read our detailed article on 5 questions to ask yourself before deciding on your Wedding Monogram or Wedding Logo

3) Overthinking your design

Who would not love to match everything from their Save the Date, to their wedding card, to their stationery – for it to all look amazingly coordinated & cohesive?

Although, in hope of the above, if you spend too much sweat on design nitty-gritties or in foreseeing how it will look in the cards & stationery – you’re in for waste of precious time!

It doesn’t mean that you send out something incomplete / amateur & of course it should be something you love – all that we’re trying to say is that don’t overthink it & spend oodles of time by making edits to it!

Instead, you can be creative & quick to use something that you may already have on hand :
– Show of your photographs.
– Make a cute video created on your story.
– A timeline with fun-facts about you guys.
– Create a fun game / engaging puzzle to make it interactive.

Basically, do something quirky & catchy, as you may not be able to do in the “formal” wedding invitation. Make it ALL ABOUT YOU!

Take a look at the example below :

The above options can really make your Save the Date stand out! Oh, and be sure to score full points for your out-of-the-box idea!

4) Giving too much information

If you go through our previous blog post  & our IGTV series, we talk about the kind of information that needs to go on a Save the Date.

We’re summarizing it for you below :

1) Wedding monogram / logo (only if you are 100% sure about it).
2) The couple’s names.
3) The location of the wedding : the name of the city is good enough.
4) The date(s) of the wedding.
5) RSVP detail(s) : number / email address / website / date of RSVP.
6) Hashtag (only if you are 100% sure about it).
7) Parents’ names / family name.
8) Footer : formal invitation to follow.

You don’t need to mention all of the above information, (you can pick what suits you most) as long as the matter is crisp, neat & in a bullet point like format, just enough to get the message across – it should be perfect!

Take a look at the example below :

Information that can be skipped :

– Flowery language
– Hotel / venue details
– Name of the functions
– Timings
– Dress Code
– Family tree
– Company details

All of these are to be kept for the main wedding invitation.

As you can see in all the Save the Date examples above, the couple has chosen to give the information that works for them. Do not hesitate to pick & choose as per your requirement.

5) Being unclear about your function-wise guest list

This point is very important, as a lot of us tend to go haywire here – specially the older generation! The parents or grandparents are always super excited about sending out (forwarding) the Save the Date to everyone in their contact list, without making a function-wise guest list (ouch!).

In most Indian / South Asian weddings, there are chances that you likely have multiple functions & it is not necessary that all your guests will be invited to each & every one of them.

You will, most probably, have minimum guests for your intimate affairs.
The number of attendees gradually increases depending on the fan-fare of the event.
Your maximum attendees are likely to be invited for your biggest event, i.e. – maybe the Wedding or the Reception.
This happens mainly in home city weddings with a large numbers of invitees.

Yes, when it comes to destination weddings, all your guests, most likely, will be attending every function!

Irrespective of the above, when it comes to sending out your E-Save the Date, ensure that you have separate artworks created with different dates & combinations so you can easily mail it / forward it out as per your pre-prepared guest list.

If you are sending physically printed Save the Dates, you should ideally send it out to only those who are invited to every event (you need not make prints with separate dates, as that might cost you a fortune). You can choose to send the E-copies to those who are invited only for a part of the events.

Also, it can look really bad on your part or the family’s part, if you send a Save the Date to a guest for a particular function & then not follow it up with the main wedding card!

6) Sending your Save the Date in holiday season

Well, we live in an age of junk mails & bulk forwards, especially during the festive season! Mail boxes, e-mail inboxes, messaging app groups & cell-phones are spammed with all sorts of greetings & to be honest absolutely no one is interested in looking at them – let alone replying to them!

There is no way your Save the Date (irrespective of whether it is a hard copy or an E-invite) will stand out in this chaos & for all you know it might get trashed / marked as junk! It can go unnoticed by many of your guests & the whole exercise might be futile!

Be it Diwali, Ganpati, Navratri, Easter, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s – as much as you might want your guests to receive your Save the Date on an auspicious day, all your effort may go in vain!

Oh and, if you’re expecting an RSVP! Phew…. ‘Tis holiday time people!

7) Not having a message in the body copy of the artwork / image.

This mainly applies to those who are sending out E-Save the Dates.

If you are likely to forward the artwork via e-mail or a messaging app, please ensure to write a little bit about what the message contains – this is irrespective of whether you are sending it out personally or on a group.

For example :

Dear friends & family,
We’re so glad to announce our wedding dates! We look forward to seeing you at the celebrations!

OR

Dear XYZ,
We cordially invite you & request you to Save the Date for the wedding of A & B!
We look forward to welcoming you at the festivities!

This will alert the receiver that it is not a generic forwarded message or image, & will take the effort to open it up.

8) Sending it in a format that does not open on all devices

This is applicable for E-versions only.

Whether you are sending a still image, a video, a GIF be sure to have the file in a format that can be viewed on all kinds of devices.

Also keep in mind, one that is not too heavy in MBs for it to load on cell-phones or e-mails.

This is one of the main reasons, why some Save the Dates do go unnoticed.

#Protips for E-verions :

– Do make sure to use legible fonts so the guests need not zoom in too much to view the details.

– We highly recommend you use a vertical orientation if the artwork allows it – it looks great on cell-phones as well as on e-mails, & also allows enough breathing space for the design.

– If you are using photographs, refrain from using low-resolution images or ones that are clicked from a phone. It can look pixelated / blurred & that’s the last thing you want!

– Keep in mind the date by which you’d like your guests to RSVP you, & back calculate with enough buffer time.

#Protips for physical copies :

– If you are using photographs, refrain from using low-resolution images or ones that are clicked from a phone. It can look pixelated / blurred & that’s the last thing you want!

– Keep in mind the date by which you’d like your guests to RSVP you, & back calculate with enough buffer time.

– Ensure that your envelope has a return address printed, so that your RSVP can come back to you correctly.

The above mentioned guidelines are mere indications of what we feel works best!

As you can tell, we don’t believe that there’s only one right way of doing things. We’ve attempted to address common short-falls, but please feel free, to disregard it all.
We’re all for doing YOUR WEDDING, YOUR WAY!

While the whole invitation process can be quite daunting, our constant endeavour is to always ensure that we can make it extremely easy & comfortable for all of you.
And this is our way of doing our bit!

We hope we have been helpful & informative!

Should you have any feedback or want us to cover any particular topic, feel free to leave your comments below.
We lovingly invite you to subscribe to our blog for upcoming articles & future blog posts.

For any further questions, we’re just an email away & we will try to help you resolve any queries you may have!

We can be reached on info@customizingcreativity.in

You can take a look at some of our latest work via these links :-
Website : www.customizingcreativity.in
Instagram handle : instagram.com/customizing_creativity (don’t miss out on our IGTV series for further insight into this topic)
Facebook page : Facebook.com/dishamehtadesign

We’d love for you to #startyournewbeginningwithus

Until next time,
Disha & Harsh Munshaw
Customizing Creativity