!@#$%&()^!!! INVITES!!! - The PASH Wedding Forums and Message Boards

DragonYoga · #1 06-19-2006, 12:46 PM

WHY are the friggin' invites so EXPENSIVE!!!!!

I've started looking around, I know what I want, but aw gawd the ones I like (simple and classic) are EXPENSIVE and the cheap ones are as tacky as... hell I donno! Fill in yer blank here...!

*starts to twitch over the ridiculous costs*

Clarity · #2 06-19-2006, 01:59 PM

DITTO!! I wanted something simple but something that would stand out but I couldn't afford to get married if I "bought" them. I am going to make my own, (I worked at home doing some local advertising materials...flyers, biz cards, etc) so I have the basic equipment. My future step daughter (my only daughter

) is going to help assemble whatever we come up with.

But how can paper and ink cost so much money? Most have been all the trees we killed in the rainforest in the 80s!

Complicated Woman · #3 06-19-2006, 02:06 PM

Have you looked at craft stores for the print your owns? There are plenty of very simple ones from Wilton from about 50 cents each and Gartner has some more elaborate ones that are a little bit more (about 80 cents).

I'll be back in a sec with some links...
Here's the Gartner page -- I bought invites from them for about 1.20 total invitation package...including a jacket, response card, invite, envelopes, and ribbon for embellishment. Not too bad.

Here's the Wilton page with invitation styles on it. There are some very elegant and simple ones for really very little expense.

HTH!

Marge129 · #4 06-19-2006, 02:24 PM

I got a good deal at www.now-and-forever.com for my invitations.

breezy · #5 06-19-2006, 03:27 PM

Also if you have access to Costco, I've heard they have FANTASTIC prices.

whiddle · #6 06-19-2006, 04:54 PM

I used the print yourself kits. You couldn't even tell that they weren't purchased. I think it was like $75 for the whole kit.

Kim&Bob2004 · #7 06-19-2006, 05:05 PM

We bought ours at www.rexcraft.com We were very happy with prices, selection and speed of delivery. We wanted something simple and I wanted the nice feel of printed invites which you can't get with most home printers, and I didn't want the hassle of making them so they were a GREAT solution. Once I figures time, cost et al, they were far cheaper, IMHO. Hope they give you some ideas. BTW, I don't get a kick back from them, I am just a satisfied customer!

weddingadvisor · #8 06-19-2006, 05:15 PM

I'm doing my own as well. FI has a fantastic printer, why pay for someone to do it?

Plus, I take pride in re-creating something that a 'professional' charges for. It's a nice feeling knowing I saved so much $$ doing it myself.

Kim&Bob2004 · #9 06-19-2006, 05:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by weddingadvisor

I'm doing my own as well. FI has a fantastic printer, why pay for someone to do it?

Plus, I take pride in re-creating something that a 'professional' charges for. It's a nice feeling knowing I saved so much $$ doing it myself.

For me it was a big life saver to have someone else take over that detail so I could concentrate on something else. We did everything for our wedding, even the flowers, so having one less thing to worry about doing was a life saver. Just me though.

DragonYoga · #10 06-19-2006, 08:48 PM

Thanks for the links, girls! I'll check them out tmw morning after work when I'm in my computer potato mood.

I'm currently undecided on if I should make my own (I'm very creative/artistic) or buy. For one, we will have a small guest list - about 70 so I was thinking of hand-lettering the invites. Time is on my side for now *hah* so that's still a consideration. One reason why I was thinking of hand lettering is because I haven't used my blasted printer in so long it'd cost a small fortune for me to use up the ink "reminding" the thing how to print properly!

Hand-crafted invites, hand-lettered. What ya think?

weddingadvisor · #11 06-19-2006, 09:05 PM

Very old fashioned, but if you want to do it, why not?

I know etiquette would rule in favor of hand addressed invites.

Complicated Woman · #12 06-19-2006, 09:06 PM

If you can do it and make it look nice, go for it. It does sound kind of labor intensive, but if it's something you want to spend time on, I don't see any reason not to.

Lizbet · #13 06-19-2006, 09:10 PM

Do you mean hand addressed or totally hand written invites?

I hand addressed mine, and it wasn't too bad. But, I can't imagine hand writing all of them. (Of course I had about 250 to send, not 70. I have a really big extended family that would have been hurt if they weren't invited, eventhough they weren't able to come.)

whiddle · #14 06-19-2006, 09:24 PM

I think she means totally written invites.

I would not go there.

clairon13 · #15 06-19-2006, 10:40 PM

i considered for the *briefest* of moments letting DH's mom do the calligraphy on the invites. i knew she wanted to be involved; it would certainly have saved us some $, but then i decided that A) i'm too much of a control freak, and what if i didn't like it? so, i began shopping, and found an invite i liked. the funny thing is when we got them in, rickey's like "we paid for that? apparently he could have done what we got on his printer, etc anway! if you have the time and energy (NOW) go ahead and do your own, if not, do like kim and me, and just go w/ what you can afford. and as much as we love our invites, the sad truth is that no matter how much time/money we spend on them, most people just throw them away after the wedding.

Robyn Lynn · #16 06-20-2006, 01:46 AM

To date, I've handwritten about 100 invites. Start early and just pace yourself

555Ann555 · #17 06-20-2006, 01:52 AM

I made ours but I make cards anyway... I knew what I liked & it wasn't within our budget to have them. They are crazy prices over here; hand made invites set you back about £3 each!

I could have afforded to buy invites, just not what I would have wanted.

I'm really glad I made them all early though! It was crazy having to make a couple of extra ones at the end so I think I would've been suicidal if I'd left them all till then!

I bought textured paper for the inserts, textured envelopes & cardstock, so they didn't look like I'd run them off at work!

DragonYoga · #18 06-20-2006, 02:56 AM

That's what I'm planning to do, Ann! That, and get a vellum type print so I can trace the letters to make it look like calligraphy... If I can find that, GREAT. Since I want chocolate and cream, and ALL of the ones I've seen so far (I haven't checked the links suggested here yet), were like $300 to $500 and I am SO not willing to spend that much money on some friggin' invites!

this is the kind I would like... it LOOKS like a good price, but after adding up all the ones I will "need".... it's about $300 something.

http://sandstone.cceasy.com/order/WE...rmat=WedEnsCCa

clairon13 · #19 06-20-2006, 04:24 AM

hey! those look kinda like our invites, except ours were portrait style (long instead of wide) and i had them printed w/ white ink. the thing that bothered me initially was all the other invites on that entire website came w/ raised lettering (thermograph??) EXCEPT white!! and of course, for the print to be visible, i had to go w/ white or ivory. c'est la vie i suppose! but everyone loved seeing the brown b/cs it is a tad unexpected, esp for a wedding.... and you could easily do these yourself... get a gold, ivory/white, or silver metallic pen for teh lettering... get nice, rich paper like ann suggested, and then have fun! i pushed so much back to the last minute, i'm sure that's a major reason why i didn't do handmade!!

DragonYoga · #20 06-20-2006, 01:30 PM

Yeah, I was thinking that! I asked Marv to do his guest list this week and get his mom's...I'll be doing mine and get one from Mom then we'll decide. Once that's decided, I'll start on the invites!

MrsStarks06 · #21 07-02-2006, 01:07 AM

I got mine from a mag. called Willow Tree Lane. My invatations came in a package and it saved me!!!!!!!!!!! I got 100 invatations for only 150.00. At least i thought it was cheap compared to other places with the same invatation i wanted. they also have a web site go there and look.

AlwaysABride · #22 07-02-2006, 01:35 AM

I completely understand you -- I was set all set to purchase wedding stationery but man! Looking at the prices they are asking for even the plainest-looking invites was ridiculous!!!

I have opted to DIYBride on this one -- I am creating my own enire vow renewal stationey set myself, from my save-the-dates to our thank-you cards, designing them myself and taking them to Kinko's or something to be printed and cut, and assembling them ourselves.

Our event budget is not that big, and to blow a majority of it on the stationery alone is something I wasn't willing to do.

sparklesweetie · #23 07-02-2006, 03:13 AM

Going to suggest another site..... www.annswedding.com They are very very reasonable, and quick too. I had mine in less than a week after I ordered them. I also didn't order the TY cards, I made those myself.