Number of invites needed vs guests

Melokiel · November 2012

So while trying to get an estimate for how much invites are going to cost, I've been using the number of guests we are expecting to invite (200-250). However, it just recently dawned on me that I don't need an invite for every guest as many of them are married, living together, etc.. Until we nail down a final guest list to figure out exactly how many we need I figured I could halve that and add a few to get a better idea for the cost. Will that be enough? How many invites did you end up needing versus the number of guests that were invited?

libby2483 · November 2012

It is probably best to just count up the number of households you will be inviting. This is what I did and it only took a few minutes. There really isn't a formula. For example, you may be inviting lots of couples and single people and not inviting kids. In this case, you will need a lot more invitations than if you are inviting several families that have lots of kids, where there would only be one invitation sent per household.

Personally, we invited 215 people and sent out 95 invitations, as we had a pretty good mix of singles, couples, and families with children.

maggieandrey · November 2012

Ditto PP, you probably have people grouped on your list anyway with their SO/kids, etc. so just count how many parties.

I made 160 invitations but only actually mailed 152 for a guest list of 306. So that's almost exactly half, but it's probably coincidence. I have a mix of families, singles, and couples.

Melokiel · November 2012

I would do that but I haven't even seen the list his mother made up for his side of the family. All I know is its about 150 people. I did that with my side of course to help with getting the save the dates ordered as I think we are only sending them to my side and perhaps a few of his that are out of the country. We are only 1 month into planning and haven't finalized the list anyway so I was just trying to price things out. Should I just multiple the number I needed by 3 (the rate of his list to mine) to get an estimate?

Kmueller272 · November 2012

I made the same mistake...but didn't realize it after we ordered the STDs, haha. Well, at least I noticed it before the invites which are way more expensive.
I made an excel spreadsheet with our list and grouped couples in the same line after one another. For single people I just left the second name blank. Then I added the number 1 or 2 behind each line to signify single or couple. I added all those up on the bottom with the formula to give me the total invited guest count. In order to get the invite count straight without having to count them all, I just added a 1 in front of each line and then added them all up on the bottom. I am going to order 15-20 invites more than that number, just to be safe.

You shouldn't order anything until you've seen the proper list from his side. That's not too much to ask. They need to tell you which ones are couples. Depending on your invites, this can mean the difference between paying hundreds of $ for nothing, so you should definitely get a clear understanding of the count first.

OliveOilsMom · November 2012

Why can't you just ask FMIL for the list? Tell her you want to create an official list on your computer to have. And you need to know how many couples vs single people are on the list, so you know how many invites, etc to order.

B2Z728 · November 2012

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_invites-paper_number-of-invites-needed-vs-guests?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:cd062f89-8272-496a-b0ab-225e1f87acecDiscussion:6669a6d2-89ce-47b2-843a-1cf6b40a4d55Post:6d4d8cec-31e8-438e-a1ec-aa0b221e7cc2">Re: Number of invites needed vs guests</a>:
[QUOTE]Why can't you just ask FMIL for the list? Tell her you want to create an official list on your computer to have. And you need to know how many couples vs single people are on the list, so you know how many invites, etc to order.
Posted by OliveOilsMom[/QUOTE]

<div>This is really the best thing to do. You're going to need that list to send out your save the dates and eventually for mailing your invitations. You should have an accurate count so that you do not over order and waste money. Creating a Google Doc and Google Spreadsheet of my guest list was very useful in my wedding planning. </div><div>
</div><div>We invited 170 guests, and mailed about 100 invitations. I ordered 25 extra invitations and envelopes because I had to order in quantities of 25, but we ended up only needing a few extra and have a lot left over. </div>

libby2483 · November 2012

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_invites-paper_number-of-invites-needed-vs-guests?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:cd062f89-8272-496a-b0ab-225e1f87acecDiscussion:6669a6d2-89ce-47b2-843a-1cf6b40a4d55Post:f5d4767a-d50b-4962-8b56-26b191942d1e">Re: Number of invites needed vs guests</a>:
[QUOTE]I would do that but I haven't even seen the list his mother made up for his side of the family. All I know is its about 150 people. I did that with my side of course to help with getting the save the dates ordered as I think we are only sending them to my side and perhaps a few of his that are out of the country. We are only 1 month into planning and haven't finalized the list anyway so I was just trying to price things out. Should I just multiple the number I needed by 3 (the rate of his list to mine) to get an estimate?
Posted by Melokiel[/QUOTE]

<div>I would recommend just asking her how many households there are. With how expensive invitations can be, it is really best to have an exact number, and then order some extras. It would be a big waste of money if you ordered 50 extra invitations, and a big waste of time to order to sets because you didn't get enough the first time.</div>

Kathryn Wagner · November 2012

I actually order for my save the dates the whole number of guest but it is a good idea to jsut count the households. I will do that for my invites.

lovesclimbing · November 2012

I would ask her to at least get you a ball park figure of how many invitations will be needed. She should know who is in a household and who isn't. As the PPs have said, that's really not too much to ask unless she's out of town and doesn't have her address book with her to look through.

If it's not too firm yet, order extras. I would order at least 20 extra invitations for those people you don't know about. My mom and my FMIL gave me pretty firm lists and I only ordered 10 extras for those "Oh snap, I forgot them, they need an invite!" occurences. Unfortunately, there've been a lot of those and yesterday, my mom added five more households to the list and we simply don't have that many invites. I had to tell her that only three can be invited.

TL:DR Buy extras just in case!

Number of invites needed vs guests

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