Planning a wedding can be stressful and pricy. As I was planning my own wedding I was trying to cut cost where I could without risking quality. The first thing that came to mind was making my own invitations. Sadly you can’t cut cost on stamps, but you can with DIY designing and printing.
The price of just purchasing invitations, not including envelopes, gatefolds, RSVP cards, or details/accommodations cards, could be from $2-5 dollars depending on design you want. Purchasing all the other things just keeps increasing the price for the set of invites, which can cost upwards of $500 for 65 invitation sets.
Designing and printing your own is much more cost effective. I made 65 invitation sets and only cost $167, this included kraft envelopes, return envelopes, gatefolds, invitation (front and back for English and Chinese), details cards, and RSVP cards.
The first step to designing your invites, you have to decided which program to use. I already have Photoshop on my computer and didn’t have to purchase an additional license. You could always sign up for a free trial.
The second step is to decided how you want the invites to look like. My wedding was a rustic theme and the colors were burgundy, blush, and navy. This part takes some time in order to acquire the freebie patterns and designs that matches the theme I was going for. I used sites such as thehungryjepg.com, fontbundles.net, and creativemarket.com. You can also google for freebies. I kept my eye out on freebie days to see if the freebie of the week matches my theme. Over the course of two to three months I was able to download multiple fonts, including cursive and sans fonts, and watercolor plant vectors. I wasn’t able to find a burgundy watercolor florals that I wanted, so I went onto Etsy and found a seller that sold watercolor florals for $4. After having downloaded everything I needed for my invites, I played around with the layouts and designs on Photoshop, while using photos on wedding websites as a guide.
Once the design has been finalize I set out to print using a local print shop. My home printer was not compatible with printing on cardstock. My local shop charged a total of $83 for printing 65 invites, details card, and RSVP cards. I purchased kraft A1 ($11.94) and A7 ($9.99) envelopes from Amazon.
As for the gatefolds, you don’t really need them, but in my case I needed them for more traditional family members that require the invites to be “red”. I already have the Silhouette Cameo for cutting on cardstock and all I needed was to purchase the cardstock and the pattern I wanted to cut. The cardstock was $11.99 for a pack of 25 and the pattern for the gatefold was $10.00 on Etsy.
Places to get freebies
- TheHungryJPEG.com – Wednesday freebie and monthly freebies
- FontBundles.net
- Creativemarket.com – 6 free goodies every Monday
- dafont.com
- freepik.com
Once your invitations are done and assembled, send them out and wait for the RSVP and compliments to roll in! Good luck on your project and congratulations on your wedding!
Sven and Robbie 