With every New Year, comes an onslaught of planning with new couples! One of the TOP questions I get asked as a wedding planner revolves around Save-The-Dates.

“When should we be sending them?”

“What should we be including in our save-the-dates?”

“How do we prepare for these properly”

So I have taken the time to fully break down the entire process for Save-The-Dates that your future self will thank you for!

This process will not only be helpful for creating and sending Save-The-Dates, but also for your formal invitations, thank you notes, seating chart, and several other planning aspects.

What should ACTUALLY go on your Save-The Dates?

Let’s keep this simple and go with a clear list ;

Your favorite photos (engagement photos are great for this)
Wedding Date
Location (can be the exact venue or just city and state)
Link to your wedding website, or a QR code to your wedding website (if you don’t have one, I highly recommend making one, they’re free)
“Formal invitation to follow” - this is a nice bonus to send a clear message to your guests that they should expect more info soon

What Should NOT go on your Save-The-Dates?

Please do not send a save-the-date to anyone who you are not CONFIDENT you want to invite.
If you have not officially booked your venue as well as major vendors (planner, catering, photo…), don’t send save-the-dates yet! The date could actually change prior to booking these major vendors, so do yourself a favor and wait until the big details are official
Consider choosing your “invitation suite” as well as save-the-dates at the same time … it’s helpful to have your save-the-dates and invitations match or go together nicely. Many “invitation suites” on etsy/zazzle/minted/the knot have templates for a save-the-date to match the invitations you like

WHEN should you send your Save-The-Dates?

Typically, I recommend anywhere from 12-6 months prior to your wedding date.

However… there are a few factors to consider when deciding on a mail date…

If your wedding is on a holiday weekend, consider sending them at least a year out
If you are having a DESTINATION wedding, definitely send out at least a year in advance if possible

What constitutes a Destination wedding?

**It is important to note that a destination wedding is not just something out of the country. This is any wedding where most of your guests will have to travel and get accommodations…

For example: getting married Up North where your guests will need to drive a long distance and stay at least one overnight counts as a destination.

If your wedding is “remote” and requires lodging accommodations for most guests, this would count as well.

Obviously anything where most guests will need to fly is considered destination.

Basically, be courteous to your guests if travel and accommodations are required for attending your big day.

Save-The-Date

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Save-The-Date 〰️

BEFORE you create your Save-The-Dates, do these things…

Create a wedding website! They are awesome and free. My favorites are The Knot or Zola. They can allow your guests to rsvp, select meal choices, send you messages, and you can relay important information such as lodging, parking, transportation, timelines, etc.
Get Engagement Photos taken! This is not only fun but a great way to get comfortable with your photographer prior to wedding day
Book your hotel room blocks/shuttles! This is huge and will be so helpful in the future for yourself and your guests. Most hotels will allow this a year prior to your date.
Gather addresses and full guest list
Choose your invitations also (remember above I mentioned wanting them to match!)

*Now you may find yourself wondering…

What should I put on my Wedding Website?

Don’t panic, you don’t need to have this entire process done super early. There are a few helpful, introductory things to put on your wedding website prior to mailing out your Save-The-Dates that will be very helpful to your guests.

Photos and “Our Story”. This can be cute and easy. One photo and a few sentences about how you met is a great start
Registry. Do it!!! You can always add more, but I highly recommend starting this early so guests can send you a gift if they are excited to do that
Lodging Information. Remember those hotel blocks I mentioned above? Give those guests some helpful info on where to secure lodging accommodations because I guarantee they will be asking as soon as they get that save-the-date.
Venue Info. This could be basic for now. Consider address, parking specifics, and lodging info if needed. It could just be a link to their website for now, or a contact email for the venue coordinator if your guests have questions.

Which brings me to my next topic

What NOT to put on your Wedding Website

*This is just for now!! We don’t want to bombard guests with too much information right off the bat. This will confuse them and cause complications for you down the road

Do not put a link to RSVP
If guests try to rsvp anyways… be polite and thank them. Then remind them that a formal invitation is coming in a bit and they need to officially rsvp then.
Do not include menu’s or meal choices yet. I promise you this will complicate things. Wait until you have officially had your final menu tasting, narrowed down any possible allergies, etc. This typically doesn’t happen until a few months prior to your wedding. Anything sooner is privy to change and could end up being a big issue down the road.

If your guests have a lot of questions or specific requests after recieving their save-the-date or checking out your website, take note and see if you can do anyting to clear things up.

Don’t be afraid to consistently refer guests back to your wedding website for any quetions you have already answered on there. You’ve put a lot of work into that and it’s only fair to requests guests do their part to read through that information before reaching out directly.

Want to go the extra mile and be SUPER organized while doing this Save-The-Date process?

I’ve got you!

Let’s Talk SPREADSHEETS!

Here are my top tips for creating a badass spreadsheet that you will be so grateful you started.

Column 1 is every single guest’s full name
Column 2 is their “address names” ex. “Mr. and Mrs. Doe” or "The Smith’s” and indictate which individual guests fall into that specific address name
Color Code - my favorite trick is to highlight guests names in the same color who are couples. Ex Jane and John Doe are highlighted yellow, because if they attend, they will likely want to sit together
Column 3 is for their full mailing address
Column 4 = checkboxes for YES rsvps (spreadsheet can total up at the bottom how many have rsvp’d yes for you)
Column 5 = checkboxes for NO rsvps (spreadsheet can total up at the bottom how many have rsvp’d no for you)
Column 6 = meal choices (I highly recommend color coding this also or using the check box method, whichever you prefer)
Column 7 = any allergies pertaining to meals (make space big enough for notes)
Any other columns you can add for other specifics (lodging, song choices, etc)
I also highly recommend noting very important specifics (typcially for venue or caterer)
1. These things could be; someone who is in a wheelchair, high chair, severe allergy
2. “Guests of Honor” typically being each of your parents, grandparents, officiant, vendors, etc… so the catering team knows to pay special attention to them
You can also start slowly lumping people into groups for table seating arrangements if you’d like. Most tables seat approx 8 guests, so consider creating groups of 6-10 who you think would like to sit together. From there, you can tweak as the rsvp’s come in.
**Side note- dont get hung up on official table NUmbERS. Those can easily be changed. Focus instead on name groupings and consider things like children, grandparents, friend groups, etc.

My final piece of advice…

HIRE A WEDDING PLANNER AND WE WILL DO ALL OF THIS FOR YOU!!

We love spreadsheets, wedding websites, helping design invitations, and all the other little details that make this process fun and not anxiety inducing.

But seriously though, we would absolutely love to help you get all of this done and more!

Hope this helps!

Happy Planning,

Kristen

Breaking Down Save-The-Dates