One of the most important jobs you will need to do when you order your wedding invitations is to make sure that all the details are 100% correct before anything goes to print.  It can be a very expensive exercise to have wedding stationery reprinted if there is an error, and ultimately once your approval is given, any errors are your responsibility.  It is important to proof correctly and hopefully we can help with a few tips below.

At Something Fabulous we have a very comprehensive proofing process and do not print anything until we have the approval of our customers. We also ask our customers to check very specfic things so that everyone can be confident, when approval is given, that all is good to go.  While many companies ask customers to enter their own information and start proofing their own invitations we do this for our customers from start to finish.

Once a customer places their order with us, it is important to collect all the correct details from the beginning.  We understand that this will be the first time that our customers have ordered wedding invitations and strive to give as much help as possible to make the process seamless and stress free.

Wedding Wording

Our first step is the send our customer an email requesting their wedding wording.  This will include the following:

• Names as they are to appear on the invitations. First names only, surnames, middle names?
• Parents names (if they will be appearing on the invitations)
• Ceremony details (time, venue and address)
• Day and date of wedding.  Eg, Friday the 12th September.
• Reception details (time, venue and address)
• RSVP Date
• RSVP details for acceptance card or invitation.
• Dress code (if required)

The way this information is put together is also an important decision, it can be formal, casual or quirky.  We have many invitation wording samples and we always send these to our customers so that they can choose which suits their wedding style best. We also have a number of examples in the wedding wording section of this blog.

Remember that any wording you provide will be copied and pasted straight into your invitation as a starting point, so it is important that you make sure that all spelling and details are correct at this stage, remember that no one knows your wedding as well as you do!

Guest List

All Something Fabulous invitations include merging of guest names into each invitation, this gives a more professional finish and means that our customers do not have the hand write names onto their invitations.  We also print all matching envelopes as part of our price so both name and address details need to be collected. We do this by sending our customer a simple excel spreadsheet to fill in and of course full instructions are given.

It is important to remember that all information entered into the spreadsheet will be merged directly into the invitations and envelopes, so when filling out any spreadsheet it is important to think about the following,

• Do you want to have guest surnames included?
• Are all guest names are spelt correctly, this is a fabulous time to check if Matthew has 1 or 2 “t’s” or is it “Geoff or Jeff”.
• Do you want shortened first names/nicknames or full names? Eg, Sue or Suzanne, Matt or Matthew, Nana & Pop or Helen & Doug. This decision will depend on how formal you wish your wedding to be, and how well you know your guests.
• Are all address details up to date and correct? Make sure you have full names of guests partners?
• Will you be hand delivering any invitations? Make a note of this and add only names in the envelope details.
• Will you be inviting children by names or adding “& family”?
• Remember to add capitals for all guest names and addresses.
• Are all address details complete with state and postcode details?

While you will get a chance to check all details, including your envelopes, in the proofing process, it is great to have them mostly correct from the start. This will save time on your proofing and mean you will receive your wedding invitations sooner, as most of the legwork will have been done.  Before you send your guest list to your invitation company, have your fiance and your parents check it thoroughly, as some guest details may not be well known to you.

At Something Fabulous we do not put a limit on the amount of time taken or the number of proofs that you make on your wedding stationery but some companies will charge after 2/3 changes so making sure that the above information is correct is very important so you do not incur extra costs.

 Proofing Tips

Here are our top proofing tips!

Have all your details, brochures and booking forms and guest list on hand.  Fresh eyes are very important so ask someone else to proof your stationery as well as yourself.

Make sure you check the following:

• Your names are spelt correctly and that of parents if they are on the invites.

• The date, day and year are correct.  Is the Friday actually the 12th September?

• Is the RSVP date correct? Check with your venue when they need their final numbers by, give yourself some added time here.

• Are the times of your ceremony and reception correct? Look at your booking forms for your venues to make sure they are the same.

• Is the spelling of your venue names and their addresses correct?

• Read through the invitation from start to finish to detect the following, is basic spelling correct? Are there any excess spaces in the wording? Is the spacing the same throughout the invitation? Is it centred if applicable?

• Flip through each invitation and check each one for correct spelling of guest names.

• Do the same for your envelopes.

Write down all errors you see and send in one list to your stationery company in one email.  Wait for your changes to come back and go back to the top of the list and start over, until all details are correct and you can confidently give your approval, tick another task off your bridal list……and look forward to receiving your fabulous invitations!