Wedding Question: When to Send Save the Date?

Comment Written by natasha on September 27, 2010 – 5:00 am

We received the following question from a reader and thought you might benefit from her question. Remember, if you have questions, feel free to ask! natasha@theweddinglens.com

phoyo from ashleypalmero

I’m getting married a year from November and we already have picked out our venue. We have a lot of people who we want to invite and we want to make sure they can come. But we’re also reallllllllllly worried about the guest list getting too big. So I guess that’s what I’m kinda wondering about – like people reserving their time for our wedding. When should we send Save the Dates? Do we have to send them to everyone at one time?

That is a great question! Technically,  you should send out Save the Dates as soon as you can so that your guests can make whatever preparations they need to make to come to your wedding. But that only applies if you WANT them at your wedding!

Your wedding is far enough away that you have some time to play with this, but I would suggest that you do your Save the Dates in shifts — especially if you haven’t solidified your guest list yet.

First, send the STDs to your close family and friends who you KNOW you are going to invite and who you really, really want to come.

Second, once you solidify your guest list a bit more, send the STDs to the more distant people who you would like to come, but who you wont be devistated about if they dont come.

Finally, you can feel free to NOT send STDs if there are people who you are just waiting on to see if you have space. I’m sure you have read our tips on handling the guest list where we recommend that you do separate A, B, and C lists for guests. Some of the C list people wont be able to be invited until some of the As and Bs say no to the invite. This means that the C list people wont be receiving a Save the Date at all.

I hope that helps resolve some of the STD anguish! Good luck!

~ Natasha