Invites and Postage-change thoughts

feignducky

Okay we were planning out invites early because of interest of DIY-ing invitations and wanting give us enough time to play with all the materials and assembly with less stress. Then a friend noted the prices for postage are changing this month. So it's sparked some research I've learned the following three things: 

Forever/std stamps are going up from 46 to 49 cents

Surcharges are going from 20 to 21 cents

Postcard rates going from 33 to 34 cents 

The best solution is to buy only enough forever stamps for everything but invites and RSVPs to be safe. There's no forever stamp for a surcharged letter, nor postcard. I know I'll be sending them after the change. If the invitations then end up over-weight or too stiff. I know I won't have a mock up done before the change to go to a post office and "test" an assembled invite. 

I'm curious if anyone's managed a .46 forever stamp on an invite with enclosures and a pocket? The materials I'm looking at appears to be pretty dense stuff (most items #80 or over including envelopes) despite the price. I was really liking a card with a pocket on the back to keep it simple, but that seems like it might be too thick or heavy when you add a matted invitation on it with an enclosure. 

Postage rate change or not I'd like to try to make an invite as surcharge free as I can but still have some extras included. I'm planning on not having any wax seals, ribbons, belly bands, nor more than three things in the pocket (max photo, info card/ticket, and postcard RSVP, being thickest) 

Also I'm curious if anyone knows what the new rate might stamps look like and when a "wedding themed" with the new rate would be issued. I'm just thankful an extra stamp probably wouldn't hurt a vintage/steampunk themed invite in the end.

huskypuppy14

I just bought enough forever stamps to cover my invites, thank you notes for wedding and shower, and rsvp cards.  I haven't done my invites yet, because I haven't done my tasting. If my invites end up needing the extra postage, I guess I'll still be able to use the forever stamps for something else, who cares if they have wedding flowers on them.

Ven&Radio

Don't forget that envelope size can incur a surcharge as well. Your post office can tell you what the standard size limit is. I have received invites with inserts and a standard stamp though.

SBmini

Does anyone know if having a 5x7 pocket insert in an A7 envelope bumps postage up over having an inner envelope? They are already more expensive, so if it pushes the invitation into the next postage bracket, I think that would make me decide against them.

princessleia22

I was going to try to rush and get mine out before the postage change.  Then I thought about it a bit more and calculated the costs.  With 3 cent increase, even for 100 invites, that would only cost $3 extra. And the surcharge increase would be an extra $1 for every 100 invites.  So, it really isn't that huge of an additional cost... even more so since I only have 30 invites to send out, so rushing would only save me a couple dollars.  And I decided that taking my time to get them right is more important than saving a couple bucks.