Paper or Paperless Invitations?

I definitely understand why some people opt for electronic invites - convenient, eco-friendly, modern, and ease of use. However, if I were to receive an electronic invite for a wedding, I would consider such a wedding to be rather informal. Not that it's a bad thing but I believe that paper invites are timeless. To me, it's so exciting to receive a paper invite. Something to hold in my hand as I read the details. An electronic invite doesn't have that same special element.

If cost is the issue, I know of plenty of websites that offer inexpensive paper invites, with cute designs.

Just my two cents!

I love the traditional invitation, plus it allows for our not so tech savy people to not call us being confused

I considered electronic invitations but ultimately opted for electronic save the dates and printed invitations. We’ll be collecting rsvps through our wedding website, but did have some traditional rsvp cards printed for some of our older guests.

Idk, I'm all for saving money but there are so many affordable options for invitations, like Vistaprint. You can always do traditional invitations and have your guests RSVP online, which will save a little bit.

I paid $64 for 60 invitations and reply cards from Vistaprint (during one of their 50% off sales), and that's after upgrading the paper on the invitations (I went with standard matte on the reply cards). I'll still need postage but still, it was pretty affordable!

I missed a wedding once because of electronic invitations, it went to my spam folder and the bride reached out to me like 2 weeks before hand but I had made plans for that day that I couldn't change so just a heads up on that.

Zazzle has some good deals on Groupon along with sales on Vistaprint. We haven't printed ours up yet but it's looking like between $60-90 for invitations and reception cards (and RSVP's thru our website)

I think an event like a wedding requires a paper invitation. I think most people expect a paper invite and may be confused if they only receive one electronically. Unfortunately, many people may not take the e-vite as seriously as a traditional invite or may ignore it expecting the "real" invitation in the mail. Also, if you have a lot of older guests who are not computer savvy you may still need to send paper invites to them.

Cost is a huge element for us. Seeing as we would need probably 60 or so invitations and would be sending some out of the country, the cost of the actual invitations and RSVP cards and postage for both...it started adding up! Even if we did post card RSVPs, the cost of postage alone ends up being over $80. That's before even touching ordering the STDs and paper invitations! And since we're on a tight budget, that's just too much.

So we've decided to go with a magnet STDs and digital invitations. For the approximately 8 or so elderly/non tech-savvy folks, we'll hand-make their invitations to keep those costs down.

We're doing a summer Sunday brunch though--so we aren't at all black tie or super formal. But I think even a formal wedding can be done this way, just so long as the formality is indicated on the invitation somewhere.

I always caution people that my grandmother once received an email invitation to a wedding several years ago and still complains about it now. In her mind it was tacky and cheap because she had to travel, book a hotel, and bring the couple a gift and they couldn't even spend the money to send her an invite in the mail.

I'm not saying don't do it, just cautioning you as to how others may perceive it.

We used evites for our engagement party and it was a disaster. We have too many people who don't frequently check their email or are unsure how to use email (grandparents). We had to do a lot of follow up to see if people received the invite and most people just texted us their response instead of using the online response option. Due to all this trouble, we will absolutely be doing paper invites and paper RSVP cards.

If you have a tech savy guest list, I would say go for the evite option since it definitely saves time and money -- if your guests know how to use them.

I did paper wedding invites as I love the look but did do electronic RSVP via our wedding site and it worked out GREAT. I am guessing you could find invites for $1 each and then not include RSVP cards and you'd be fine. I just feel like email invites would end up in people's spam folders.

Gmail is notorious for sending everything to spam. Emails from my university are always kicked to spam for some reason. Just Saturday I got an email from someone and replied. Their follow up, 16 minutes later, went into the "social" folder, which I never check. We didn't figure it out until it became obvious that I never got the response and I went hunting for it. I got an electronic invitation once, and it was a wedding where the FOG wore jeans, so it was super informal and casual.

I totally get going the eco-route! I would say though its worth doing the paper invites, they are so much more personal and formal, and i loved designing them, and send them out. It felt like a milestone in the planning process!

Thank you so much everyone!! I definitely think I'll go with the paper invitations and maybe the tech savy people (about 90% of my guest) can RSVP online. I have to say I'm super excited to design the invitations! I also think it'll be a great momento for myself

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I mean. My response to this is definitely along the lines of "Yep! Sure is cheap! Too bad we didn't have any family members willing to chip in and help pay for the wedding, huh? Then we could have afforded to send nice invitations. "
Buuuut. That's pretty aggressive. And par for my family.

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Hahahah yeah that might not go so well! I wanted to uninvite my uncle because he did something that really ticked me off buuuut my mom said that I could not wedding etiquette can be so darn annoying!

I guess it depends on your demographics. If it is younger people, probably better suited for them. For older crowds, they may have difficulty. I know several don't have email on their phone and their email addresses are spam-ed out with junk, so they may overlook. Perhaps an alternative would be some invitations to those who may have difficulty, and electronic to others who would appreciate it more.