Dilemma - Hometown recption invites - Do we need them?

Here is my dilemma…. We are having a cruise ship wedding and we have several guests coming. We sent out invitations now, the cruise is in October. We were trying to eliminate costs by having a simple wedding but now the families who can not attend the wedding are upset so we are now having a hometown reception. We have a wedding website and we are having people RSVP to the wedding and hometown reception on it. I still think for the reception we need formal invitations sent to everyone that is invited and RSVP reply cards (not everyone has the internet to RSVP on the web). My fiancé thinks that this is a waste of money. I’m worried that if we don’t send the formal invitations 3 months before the reception and reply cards that we aren’t going to get an accurate count for the reception hall. The costs are getting high… and the US Post Office is going to love me this year. I just don’t know what to do. I already sent invites out for the cruise with a “Save the Date†for the reception. Do you think it is necessary to send new invites out for the reception? Not everyone on the guest list for the reception was invited formally to the cruise. So much postage... new invites, reply cards. What is a girl to do?

I am having the same dilemma. However, I think I am going to go ahead with the invitations for the AHR, however they aren't going to be your typical "formal" wedding invitations. Instead, I think I am just going to get either wedding stationary or some type of party stationary and just print the script myself. Check out sites like eInvite - Browser Detection and www.papersource.com. They have some nice stationary for really cheap. Then for reply cards, I plan on just making reply postcards since postage is cheaper for postcards and you don't have to worry about the cost of the extra envelope. What type of reception are you having at home? Formal? Informal?

I am a bit of a freak when it comes to this so although some may not believe it is necessary I would send out the formal invites and RSVP cards for the AHR. Just gets and accurate count and makes it more official.

Yes I would send invites for the AHR but in your case only to the people who have for sure said no way are they going on the cruise. Sounds like you've covered the others with the STD for the AHR already.

Why not do postcard "reminders" leading up to the reception -- and another link to your website that requires slackers to respond with an RSVP if they are coming?

Thanks for the suggestions. Keep them coming. We are having a formal reception. I'm thinking about just doing them myself with the post card reply cards.