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As others have said, in the US the formal paper invite is considered official. When my wife and I married we still did this but we encouraged people to RSVP via

As others have said, in the US the formal paper invite is considered official. When my wife and I married we still did this but we encouraged people to RSVP via the website or email. No sense in sending more paper. It’s sad to me that we felt so pressured to do the paper invites. They’re ridiculously overpriced and all of that paper and emissions for delivery for something that can easily be delivered electronically and instantly for near zero cost. The entire wedding industry thrives on norms like these and it’s amazing to me that technology doesn’t displace more aspects.

dylan604 8y ago
How do you let people know about the website? Social media posts? How do you contact people not on social media about the website? A mailer? A phone call/text? These are just questions I would ask to understand why paper invitations are still a thing. Rather than providing a self addressed stamped envelope for the RSVP, just put the website into it. Also, people love to hang things like invitations on their fridge as a constant reminder of an event that's somewhat far into the future. Rarely is that something printed off of a website, but a card received in the mail will pretty much get placed there straight away (or maybe after sitting on the counter for a period of time).
- jmiserez 8y ago
  Do you have the current postal mailing adresses of all of your friends? I certainly don't, so I'd have to call them or write them on social media first just to get the address.
- davidcbc 8y ago
  > How do you let people know about the website? Social media posts? How do you contact people not on social media about the website? A mailer? A phone call/text? Someone should invent some kind of electronic mail for these things! > Also, people love to hang things like invitations on their fridge as a constant reminder of an event that's somewhat far into the future. Rarely is that something printed off of a website, but a card received in the mail will pretty much get placed there straight away (or maybe after sitting on the counter for a period of time). My wife and I did email invitations because we didn't consider it worth $500 for someone to have something to stick on their fridge. We were able to automatically send an email reminder a week or two ahead of time instead.
logifail 8y ago
>> It’s sad to me that we felt so pressured to do the paper invites Doesn't the entire wedding industry basically revolve around "encouraging" everyone to do a whole bunch of stuff that's either unneccessary, over-complex or simply over-priced? Paper invites are the least of your worries.
- jeromegv 8y ago
  Remember, this isn't a vendor from the evil wedding industry that forced them to do that, most likely a bunch of family members. The wedding industry is well and alive because of families and people that want to keep it alive! We kept telling everyone we didn't need or want a wedding cake. Well we ended up with a wedding cake, paid for by the sister in law, because she couldn't sleep at night thinking there wouldn't be a cake.
  - rsynnott 8y ago
    Well, it's a bit of both. Why are diamond engagement rings a thing? A vast, hideously expensive and massively successful marketing campaign. The same goes for a lot of it; people push this stuff because marketers have told them it's required.
owenversteeg 8y ago
Looks like the CO2 emissions of sending a letter are 25 grams or so. Meanwhile, an email with a 1 MB attachment is estimated to emit 19 grams of CO2 [1]. I think the real numbers might be off by a factor of 3 or more - there are so many variables: opening the email on a desktop PC and watching a video and sending it to friends would use much more, and maybe you mail the invitation to someone who doesn't get much mail and lives out of the way so the mailman has to drive 5 more minutes just for one letter. In any case, the CO2 emissions of the invite are negligible compared to other things: say on the night of sending the invitations you have a lamb dinner with your fiance and you each eat 12 oz of lamb, that dinner was responsible for 27 kg of CO2 emissions vs. 120 invitations would be only 3.5 kg. In turn, that would be far less emissions than feeding everyone 12 oz of lamb (1607 kg of CO2), which would be far less emissions than that produced by the guests arriving (say 7% take transatlantic and 28% take cross-country flights, all economy) - a whopping 73920 kg CO2 [2]. [1] https://90by2030.wordpress.com/2015/12/09/carbon-footprint-letters-versus-emails/ https://90by2030.wordpress.com/2015/12/09/carbon-footprint-l... [2] BER-NYC roundtrip is 2.4 tons/passenger in economy = 0.07120=20.16 tons + SFO-NYC roundtrip 1.6 tons/passenger in economy = 0.28120*1.6=53.76 tons. Total 73.92 tons.
- licyeus 8y ago
  Not to derail, but that estimate for carbon footprint of email seems extremely high. I believe your link is referencing a 2010 book's figures [1], which A. surely have declined in 8 years and B. seem suspect, given Netflix's 2014 claims of 300g avg yearly carbon impact per customer. 1 - https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/01/25/how-bad-is-email-for-the-environment/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/01/25...

dylan604 8y ago

How do you let people know about the website? Social media posts? How do you contact people not on social media about the website? A mailer? A phone call/text? These are just questions I would ask to understand why paper invitations are still a thing. Rather than providing a self addressed stamped envelope for the RSVP, just put the website into it. Also, people love to hang things like invitations on their fridge as a constant reminder of an event that's somewhat far into the future. Rarely is that something printed off of a website, but a card received in the mail will pretty much get placed there straight away (or maybe after sitting on the counter for a period of time).

jmiserez 8y ago
Do you have the current postal mailing adresses of all of your friends? I certainly don't, so I'd have to call them or write them on social media first just to get the address.
davidcbc 8y ago
> How do you let people know about the website? Social media posts? How do you contact people not on social media about the website? A mailer? A phone call/text? Someone should invent some kind of electronic mail for these things! > Also, people love to hang things like invitations on their fridge as a constant reminder of an event that's somewhat far into the future. Rarely is that something printed off of a website, but a card received in the mail will pretty much get placed there straight away (or maybe after sitting on the counter for a period of time). My wife and I did email invitations because we didn't consider it worth $500 for someone to have something to stick on their fridge. We were able to automatically send an email reminder a week or two ahead of time instead.

logifail 8y ago

>> It’s sad to me that we felt so pressured to do the paper invites Doesn't the entire wedding industry basically revolve around "encouraging" everyone to do a whole bunch of stuff that's either unneccessary, over-complex or simply over-priced? Paper invites are the least of your worries.

jeromegv 8y ago
Remember, this isn't a vendor from the evil wedding industry that forced them to do that, most likely a bunch of family members. The wedding industry is well and alive because of families and people that want to keep it alive! We kept telling everyone we didn't need or want a wedding cake. Well we ended up with a wedding cake, paid for by the sister in law, because she couldn't sleep at night thinking there wouldn't be a cake.
- rsynnott 8y ago
  Well, it's a bit of both. Why are diamond engagement rings a thing? A vast, hideously expensive and massively successful marketing campaign. The same goes for a lot of it; people push this stuff because marketers have told them it's required.

owenversteeg 8y ago

Looks like the CO2 emissions of sending a letter are 25 grams or so. Meanwhile, an email with a 1 MB attachment is estimated to emit 19 grams of CO2 [1]. I think the real numbers might be off by a factor of 3 or more - there are so many variables: opening the email on a desktop PC and watching a video and sending it to friends would use much more, and maybe you mail the invitation to someone who doesn't get much mail and lives out of the way so the mailman has to drive 5 more minutes just for one letter. In any case, the CO2 emissions of the invite are negligible compared to other things: say on the night of sending the invitations you have a lamb dinner with your fiance and you each eat 12 oz of lamb, that dinner was responsible for 27 kg of CO2 emissions vs. 120 invitations would be only 3.5 kg. In turn, that would be far less emissions than feeding everyone 12 oz of lamb (1607 kg of CO2), which would be far less emissions than that produced by the guests arriving (say 7% take transatlantic and 28% take cross-country flights, all economy) - a whopping 73920 kg CO2 [2]. [1] https://90by2030.wordpress.com/2015/12/09/carbon-footprint-letters-versus-emails/ https://90by2030.wordpress.com/2015/12/09/carbon-footprint-l... [2] BER-NYC roundtrip is 2.4 tons/passenger in economy = 0.07120=20.16 tons + SFO-NYC roundtrip 1.6 tons/passenger in economy = 0.28120*1.6=53.76 tons. Total 73.92 tons.

licyeus 8y ago
Not to derail, but that estimate for carbon footprint of email seems extremely high. I believe your link is referencing a 2010 book's figures [1], which A. surely have declined in 8 years and B. seem suspect, given Netflix's 2014 claims of 300g avg yearly carbon impact per customer. 1 - https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/01/25/how-bad-is-email-for-the-environment/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/01/25...