DIY STD'S & Invitations VS. Professional Printing Costs

[Meagan816]

Thanks for the cost break down.  Sometimes DIY can get just as expensive, but you found some great deals!

 

Originally Posted by acireta 

I like the DIY process, so maybe I'm biased but I loved making my invitations, and the price worked out really well with a bit of research and shopping gradually with coupons.

 

I DIYed my boarding pass invitations. Here's the price breakdown:

• Boarding passes and monograms on belly bands: Snow White 110lb cardstock, www.cardsandpockets.com, $32/200 sheets
• Ticket jackets: Tabriz blue 110lb cardstock, www.cardsandpockets.com, $19/100 sheets
• Black cardstock for belly bands: 65lb, Michaels, $1.50/25 sheets
• Blue belly band ribbon: $24/6 rolls
• Envelopes: Nero (black) No. 10 envelopes, www.envelopperinc.com, $23.80/100 (nice heavy quality)
• Wraparound labels: full page labels, Staples, $6/25 sheets

 

Total cost: $106

Approximate cost per invitation: $ 1.06

 

 

 

 

The only thing that would increase this cost is the tools (glue/double sided tape, straight cutter, corner punch, bone folder and scoring board), all of which I had before I started but it could increase the cost a bit.

 

[Meagan816]

I love these.  This is exactly what we were thinking about doing and your are so cute!  Thanks :-)
 

Originally Posted by Traci7642 

I used Vistaprint for my Save the Dates so I'm not sure if that counts as professional or DIY.  I purchased 100 post cards for a total of $24.96 (which includes shipping to my house).  That makes each save the date, $0.25.  Pretty cheap in my opinion!!! 

 

[Speckles121]

I agree Meagan..I had someone do mine for $435 for 70 of them because I don't have the time to do them or bargain shop between working, going to grad school and it being tax season. In the end it was the best decision I ever made because I could not have been nearly as creative as the lady who created mine. I will post pics soon!
 

Originally Posted by Meagan816 

Thanks for the cost break down.  Sometimes DIY can get just as expensive, but you found some great deals!

 

 

 

[Dominican Ally]

I also did my save the dates (well...save the "approximate" dates...lol since we didn't have an exact date yet....) on Vistaprint. I got 100 of them, 100 plain white envelopes, and 300ish return address labels for less than $20.00 including shipping by using some promo emails they are always sending out. I thought it turned out to be a great deal (20cents per STD including envelope and labels!)

 

For our actual invites - I want to do boarding pass or passport invitations so I'll be looking hard at whether to DIY them or order them from someone. I think I am only sending them to those who are attending or considering attending the actual destination wedding - so this should cut down the cost quite a bit!

 

Thanks for starting this thread.

 

Here are my STD's, and return labels.

 

[Traci7642]

Thanks JennyBenz and Meagan!  We received ours from VistaPrint last week and they turned out fabulously!  The quality is better than I imagined.  The postcards are our pre-save-the-dates and then we will DIY save-the-dates about a year out and then we will send DIY invitations (message in a bottle) to those that have actually rsvp'd.  I'm not a crafty person at all, so I love being able to grab so many fantastic templates and ideas from this site.  I was thinking about doing boarding passes for our save-the-dates so I may steal yours, acireta! 

[JennyBenz]

Traci, I couldn't agree with you more! I would never tackle the DIY route without this lovely site! There are so many great ideas on here and all the brides are so helpful

Are you doing a PRE-RSVP on your save the dates or "pre STD's"? I am thinking I may do something like a "tentative" RSVP on the save dates which the guests can reply to via our wedding website- But I feel most people wouldn't do that. But I really think we would benefit from a pre-RSVP so we can estimate how many guests will be attending.

[shan0487]

Thank you acireta for posting your cost breakdown- I will be checking out those websites.  I think I have decided to make boarding passes for all the guest that are attending the wedding and then just order normal invitations on Vistaprint (they have some cute beach themed invites) for those who are not attending.  That way i only have to make 20-30 invites and it should make things cheaper!

 

Does anyone know if there is a min. of paper you must purchase from most bulk websites?

[ChocoTaco7568]

Hey Shan, It depends on the website but they typically come in packs of 25, 50 or 100 sheets and you’re only required to purchase 1 pack. Price will be determined by the type of cardstock (color, weight finish), but they typically range from $8.99 to 29.99 plus S&H. I have actually purchased a lot of my metallic cardstock from Michaels. I waited for their 5 for $1 sale and used a 20% off entire purchase coupon which is by far the cheapest price that I’ve found ($.16/sheet), and they were actually in the colors I wanted. I totally cleaned them out (went to two Michaels), and probably purchased more than I needed, but I have 60 days to figure it out and make return as I deem necessary.

Does anyone know if there is a min. of paper you must purchase from most bulk websites?

[shan0487]

Great, thank you for the info!

Originally Posted by ChocoTaco7568 

Hey Shan,
It depends on the website but they typically come in packs of 25, 50 or 100 sheets and you’re only required to purchase 1 pack. Price will be determined by the type of cardstock (color, weight finish), but they typically range from $8.99 to 29.99 plus S&H. I have actually purchased a lot of my metallic cardstock from Michaels. I waited for their 5 for $1 sale and used a 20% off entire purchase coupon which is by far the cheapest price that I’ve found ($.16/sheet), and they were actually in the colors I wanted. I totally cleaned them out (went to two Michaels), and probably purchased more than I needed, but I have 60 days to figure it out and make return as I deem necessary.

 

[DwBride2Be]

Well ladies, My fiancé and I couldn't see eye to eye on the DIY project. He wanted nothing to do with making them ourselves, and he justified it by saying he didn't save all this money to start DIY-ing, lol. Also we live in a small condo and to DIY would take over our whole home, so I can understand why even me doing it without his help could be a frustration. so I tried on my own for a few nights to get the template right (passport invitations), And I was having a really hard time. Long story short, I bought them and they are amazing!! They were $4.5/invite, WAY better than I could have done, and I don't need to fight with my man anymore. I'm happy with my choice I can't figure out how to post pics here, so you'll have to take my word for it!