Van and I have been on the hunt for wedding invitations and it has called into question the alarming cost of all things wedding. There was survey done in 2005 that found the average costs of weddings to be more than $26, 000. I am quite sure that it has increased over the last two years.
Sure there are many things that we are splurging on that are important to the enjoyment of ourselves and our guests. For example, the beautiful reception location, open bar and an amazing photographer. However, there are some items where we both draw the line. (I'll save the story about the DJ who wanted to charge us $1,500 for four hours of music.)
Sure, we are ordering 200 invitations complete with response cards and about 125 additional enclosure cards for the reception in Ohio. But I think it is crazy to spend $1,000 or even $800 on 200 pieces of paper.
It's not like we are being unrealistic. We aren't trying to get all the invitations professionally printed for $100. For the $500 we want to spend, we feel that we should be able to buy really nice invitations.
A couple of weeks ago, I stopped by the little invitation store by my office to inquire about invitations. They quoted my $1,000 to create the invitations that we were looking for. I have spent hours (at least 15 hours) searching online only to come up with several designs we loved that were way outside our budget.
Thankfully, I am persistant and I did, last night, find a couple more options that were in our price range. We will see how they look when we get the samples. I'm hoping that we will be impressed.
I just have to wonder where it will end. If we and other couples like us continue to pay these prices they will continue to increase. Knowing what I am spending, I have to wonder what the average cost of a wedding will be in 20 years? $70,000?
Having a wedding where a couple can celebrate with family and friends shouldn't be a luxury. A nice wedding shouldn't be something that couple has to go thousands of dollars in debt to do.
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2 comments:
I bought a package of invitation paper at Michael's and printed them on my home computer for $5. But then again, I really didn't care what they looked like.
You could also try finding a graphic design student at one of the local colleges. They would have access to all the fancy printers at their school to do the printing and would probably charge rock bottom prices for the labor. Paper will still cost a fortune though. There is a really good wholesale paper store in Chicago we used to order from. I can't remember the name though.
I used to work with a woman who designed invitations in her spare time. I'll see if I can dig up her contact info.
I know a great printer that does 'small' runs - if you want the info, let me know. Hey, do you know Melissa IRL? You know she had your job before you did? (and I had lunch with her yesterday!)
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