13 things to consider when designing your RSVP cards
RSVP cards are the most essential card in your invitation suite when it comes to properly hosting your guests. The standard RSVP card size is 3.5x5 inches - but just because it’s tiny doesn’t mean that it’s unimportant; there is a lot to consider when designing and mailing your rsvp cards. They should be simple, easy to read and allow your guests to provide all of the necessary information for you to accommodate them at your wedding.
Below are 13 things to consider when designing your RSVP cards.
No. 1 - Make the date very very clear
To best plan your wedding in the weeks before the big day, it’s essential to have your responses all lined up. Although it may look nice to play around with typography and ornate lettering styles on your invitation, I recommend keeping the date on your RSVP card relatively simple. You want it to be easy and accessible for your guests to read. The more difficult you make it for them, the less likely they’ll send back their responses on time.
If you are sending out invitations in English and many of your guests do not speak English as their first language, I recommend writing that date out numerically as “September 7, 2021” instead of “the seventh day of September, two thousand twenty-one”. You’ll want to avoid any confusion and make it as easy as possible for your guests to follow your timeline.
Even if you are using a wedding website to RSVP, I always recommend putting the date on the paper copy of your invitations to alert your guests that you expect their response by a certain date. Otherwise, they likely won’t be in a rush to log on and might forget to reply entirely.
No. 2 - GIVE YOURSELF SOME EXTRA TIME TO GET ALL RESPONSES
If you need to finalize numbers with your venue on September 7th, do not make your “reply by” date September 7th. I always recommend giving yourself one full week before you need to confirm final numbers.
Mail will take a few days to arrive. If you guest ultimately chooses to mail back their response on the RSVP date, it may be a couple of days before you actually get the response in-hand. You wouldn’t want to give your venue, caterer and other wedding vendors numbers and then need to be add more dates as you gather those last-minute replies that didn’t make it in on time!
Some guests may not even mail them out! Life happens and they may forget or they might misplace their RSVP cards. They might even get lost in the mail - it happens! You’ll want to give yourself a few days to call around for the no-answers to make sure that all of your guests are accounted for.
No. 3 - give yourself time to organize seating arrangements.
When choosing your reply date, consider the numbers and information your other vendors will need to complete their work. For example, your venue might only need your final seating arrangements 24 hours before your event, but your stationer or calligrapher might need the final list 2 weeks before your wedding to start working on your seating chart. Be sure to make the appropriate inquiries with your vendors even before you mail out your invitations to ensure that you give yourself time to get everything organized.
And don’t forget that making your seating arrangements is often the most frustrating thing about planning a wedding. You’ll likely need to consider family relationships and politics when organizing. You may even need to get some insight from your parents or family about who can sit with who. Give yourself the time to get organized and get feedback from your family - and them some extra time for adjustments. The last thing you want is to send your seating chart to your stationer or calligrapher in a rush and then need to pay extra fees to have corrections made.
We require all final seating chart information 14 days before the event and recommend that our clients make their RSVP dates 4-6 weeks before their event (depending on the size of their guest list) to give them plenty of time to confirm all responses and organize all of their information.
No. 4 - Leave enough ROOM FOR ALL GUEST NAMES
You’ve likely seen beautiful RSVP cards with single lines for names, but these are often for photoshoots and not practical for reality. If you’re inviting a lot of families, one line for all names likely won’t suffice, so consider adding a few extra lines to give your guests the space to write out their names. You want to give them enough room to advise of all guest names - if you leave them only one line, your guests might be inclined to vaguely write “the Smiths” instead of the individual names, which are essential for your guest count - and confirming spelling for your place cards and seating charts.
No. 5 - HAVE YOUR GUESTS SPECIFICALLY INDICATE whether or not they’ll BE attendING.
You want to make it very clear and easy for them to respond. It wouldn’t be helpful to get only a response card back with only names and no indication of whether or not they’ll be attending. By adding checkboxes or some sort of response indicator that they need to fill out, you can save your guests (and your future self) the headache of uncertainty. Some of your guests may have never filled out an RSVP card before so you want to make it as clear and simple as possible.
No. 6 - CONSIDER REQUESTING MEAL INFORMATION
If you’re having your guests select their own entrees, your RSVP card is the place to get that information. You can use graphs or words but again, you may want to leave instructions like, “Please initial your entree” so you know which guest would like what meal. If you simply ask them to tick off a checkbox but the reply card is for the whole family, you may ultimately have to call your guests to specify who wanted which entree.
I also always recommend asking guests to indicate food allergies or intolerances. You might think it’s common sense for your guests to advise of their allergies, but reminding them to share that information is an easy way to avoid health emergencies or illness on your big day.
You may also want guests to specify children’s meals if you’re inviting extended families or friends you haven’t seen in a long time. Be sure to check with your caterer any age limitations for children’s meals to avoid yourself a headache (and extra fees!) in the future.
No. 7 - Consider who is invited - and who isn’t
If you’re trying to keep guest numbers low, a great way to advise your guests about that is to advise how many seats you are reserving for them. By letting them know that you’re saving two seats for them, you’ll save yourself the headache from guests bringing uninvited company,
For adults-only receptions, I recommend adding this line as a gentle reminder John and Jane are invited but that their three children are not.
No. 8 - DON’T INCLUDE INFORMATION THAT YOUR GUESTS will NEED
If you’re including any information that your guests will need, do not include it on the RSVP card. I’ve seen gift registry information on a reply card which only lead to a headache when guests had to contact the bride to get the information again after sending out their responses.
Remember, the easier you make things for your guests, the less stress you’ll have later!
No. 9 - INCLUDE SNEAK-PEEK DETAILS
The best things about the RSVP cards is that guest see them for a little bit but eventually send them back to you. For this reason, I love adding little sneak peeks of what the wedding will look like on the RSVP card. For example, on your big day, your guests might recognize your wedding crest from the RSVP card.
RSVP envelopes are even a great way to introduce a secondary colour to your invitations to give them an extra pop if your invitations are printed on white. You can make your RSVP envelope match the main envelope or you can use a totally different colour as an extra wedding sneak peek.
No. 10 - MAKE THEM FUN (as well as FUNCTIONAL)
Even though you need to obtain specific information on your RSVP cards, that doesn’t mean that they have to be boring. You can make them fun by adding design elements or add a space for your guests to engage with your event. One example that I see most often is asking guests for song requests. You could also ask for drink requests or create your own mad libs for guests to fill out on the back of the crds for an extra laugh.
Ultimately, your invitations are a reflection of who you are as a couple. Don’t hesitate to add your personal touches to your reply cards once you hit all of the basics.
No. 11 - DON’T CHARGE YOUR GUESTS TO Respond
If you’re expecting your guests to mail back their RSVP cards, be sure that your budget includes the postage for the envelopes or postcards! You wouldn’t want your guests to need to go to the post office to buy stamps to mail back their response. Like I mentioned earlier, you want to make it as easy as possible to get those answers back. Besides, you don’t want your guests to need to pay to give you a yes or no answer.
Alternatively, some of my clients have opted for both mail-in replies and wedding-website responses. This will mean that you’ll have RSVP’s in two places, but they should be relatively easy for you to manage. If you have the wedding-website option, you technically don’t need to add postage to your RSVP envelopes because your guests have a “free” option to respond. You may even consider not sending an RSVP card at all if you’d like all your guests to reply on your website.
Keep in mind that older generations or the technologically illiterate might have a hard time responding electronically and prefer to mail out their replies if the option is there. If you anticipate that certain guests will have some trouble, consider adding postage to their reply cards.
No. 12 - create a spreadsheet
Be sure to create a spreadsheet with all the names and addresses of all of your invited guests! If you are having a designer or printing company print your envelopes, they will request that you provide them an address spreadsheet - you can use this document to keep track of responses, guest counts and any guest-specific notes, such as allergies or child meals.
Once your wedding comes and goes, hold on to the spreadsheet - it will come in handy when it’s time to send your thank you cards!
No. 13 - Number the back of your card
If you’re assembling your own invitations, this might make assembly take a bit longer but always number the back of your reply cards. I recommend writing the number in pencil or pen at the back of the reply card with the numbers matching the rows relative to those guests on your address spreadsheet. For example, if John and Jane Smith are row 4 on your spreadsheet, write the number “4” at the back of the card. Be sure to take extra care to ensure that the proper RSVP card goes in the proper mailing envelope!
Why? Well, sometimes, your guests will have very very bad writing or will forget to write their names on the card entirely in their rush to mail it out. If you receive a reply card back with an acceptance or decline, but no name or no decipherable name, you can look at the number you noted and confirm that it was mailed by John and Jane. You won’t need to call them later to ask what their answers are, saving you a headache in the future!
This one is easy to forget during the busyness and excitement of packing your invitations. Most stationers include this service if you have having them assemble your invitations, but be sure to ask if you aren’t sure.
Even though your rsvp cards need to be functional, that doesn’t mean that they can’t be beautiful…
Having a stationer design your invitations will mean that you don’t have to worry or stress out about forgetting these details - they’ll take care of this for you and balance out function with design.
Interested in reaching out for your custom invitations?