In the era of Pinterest, Etsy, and just about every other wedding site out there, it’s easy to get caught up in all the fun possibilities of everything wedding related. I’m currently caught up in the trend of creative Save the Dates. For the majority of them, I think the idea is fun – and can be somewhat memorable – but are they practical? Probably not.
Here are a few of my favorite practical (and not so practical 
) save the dates that I’ve come across recently.
The Proposal Save the Date
(source: etsy.com/shop/violaprints)
Considering our entire proposal was documented (photos here – videos here) this could work. I love the idea of sharing the proposal story, but I also feel like I’ve shared the story so many times, that it’s not exactly ‘new’ news anymore.
Save-the-Date Stickers
(source: marthastewartweddings.com)
As someone who still keeps a calendar on the wall in the office, these stickers would be perfect for peeling and placing right on the date so that I wouldn’t forget. However, since our wedding is the first month of the year (and I know I usually don’t buy a new calendar until December or even January sometimes), the save-the-dates stickers wouldn’t be as practical for us.
Coaster Save the Dates
(source: ohsobeautifulpaper.com)
Let’s file this one under the fun-but-not-so-practical category. These are more of a novelty item that you receive in the mail and think about how cute they are before you realize they’re too heavy for the magnet to hold up on the fridge. After that the coaster ends up in the bar area and a couple of months down the road you’re squinting through wine stains to try and make out the wedding website address.
Balloon Save the Dates
(source: marthastewartweddings.com)
Again, fun, but not practical. 
Save-the-Date On a String
So cute and so fun! I could definitely see these as a fun DIY project, but once you factor in the time it would take to create all of them and how much the materials would be (plus the postage to send the awkward size and weight), I could see the DIY project becoming a nightmare.
Save-the-Date Postcards
I actually contacted the Etsy seller about these vintage postcards, but I’m not 100% sold on them yet. They’re adorable, not terribly priced, and I like that we wouldn’t have to deal with envelopes, extra postage, or anything crazy. Just address and send. Plus, the look and feel would totally fit in with our theme.
Save-the-Date Library Card
Love it. Cute. Simple. Fun. These would totally work if Derek and I were huge book nerds, but we’re not. I’m not even sure either of us have library cards , which is a shame! We should really get on that.
Save-the-Date Magnets
(source: weddingpaperdivas.com)
This is what’s ‘hot’ right now. I have a fridge full of them to prove it.
(Perhaps it’s time I threw some of the old ones out?)
And I can see why they’re so ‘hot’ – they’re easy, practical, and, well, everyone has a fridge to stick them on. They can be a tad pricy (more than the postcard option), but could be worth it in the end.
Those are my favorites – what about yours?
As cute as the ultra-creative save the dates are (read: the not-so practical ones), I can’t say I’ve ever actually received any. Just the typical magnet and postcards have been on my fridge.
{ 60 comments… read them below or add one }
go to yourfullplate.com NOW and check Marla’s out. you’ll die, Meghann.
HAHAHAHA love it!
bahaha Kinda hilarious you still have mine on your fridge! That was sent out last summer.
Yours was one of my favorites! It’s so pretty!
Postcard! It looks great and is easy to send. And you can recycle a card, a magnet is more wasteful.
We made postcards! You could probably make them yourselves, too. You have to buy the postcard paper and then get to work!
we used costco. simple, inexpensive and did the trick!
No STD for us because we were on a tight budget. It’s so not a necessity and one of the easiest things to cut in your wedding budget. But if you’ve got the extra dough, PostCard is cute.
We went with a magnet with one of our engagement photos. If you don’t do the larger ones, then it doesn’t end up requiring extra postage.
Glad to see magnet STD’s are still popular. We did magnets when we sent ours out almost 8 years ago!!
As a wedding guest, I like magnets the bestm because they don’t get lost in a pile of mail & other paperwork.
We did postcards! We printed pictures at CVS and stuck on postcard backing (we bought them here: http://www.the2buds.com/suph2pc.htm). It gave us the chance to write something personal to everyone, but you can stamp/print on them too. Super cheap (about .75 cents a card including postage) and super easy.
with the proliferation of stainless steel fridges these days (magnets dont stick) I’d think magnets have diminishing practicality too. I think the postcard is best.
They’re all great, but I love the post card, and it’s very easy and practical. But I’m a practical person, so I will always lean that direction haha!
We did save-the-date magnets when we got engaged about five years ago, and they worked out great for us. Sometimes practical beats original, and I think this might be one of those cases.
P.S. If you’re tech-savvy enough to design it yourself, you can upload your own artwork to VistaPrint and their magnets are ultra-cheap. (Much less than the “wedding” branded save-the-dates we were originally looking at). We did our invites there too, and we saved so much money.
Eric & I used a FREE design from weddingchicks.com & then used a 100 free postcards deal from VistaPrint. I splurged the extra $12 for recycled cardstock. In total our 100 STD postcards cost $20. Plus, stamps for postcards are only 32 cents!
We had a family member who is a graphic designer create our image and then printed postcards thru VistaPrint for SUPER cheap! Postcard postage is also less than standard postage, which saved us money and no envelopes meant saving paper too! For 75 save the dates the grand total was $50. I mean you can’t beat that!!! The vintage ones look really adorable too.
I am totally gonna do the magnet idea!
Whenever I do end up getting married I mean….
We did the first one (play by play of the proposal) but as a magnet. I was so on board with the postcard until my sister pointed out that she uses her magnet save the dates to hold up the postcard ones on the fridge! Magnets really make sure no one forgets the ever important date
I’m getting married in Tampa in October so I may be emailing you for some recommendations in the future as we don’t live there and don’t know anyone that does!
We made our own Save The Date magnets and saved a ton of $! Plus they were way more unique:
http://fortheloveofskinny.com/2011/04/15/diy-save-the-date-magnets/
If you do the postcard, I would be hesitant about a couple things—we were thinking of it and ordered a sample. Here’s what I found out:
Kinda looks like a magazine ad. Cool, but will it get lost in junk mail and thrown away?
The post office can be rough with them—they can stamp them, wrinkle them, they could get dirty, etc.
I love the idea and might do them, too, but those are some things to think about!
Our save the dates had a cute drawing of the rear-view of a bride and groom driving away. The license plate of the car was a scratch-off and our date was underneath. I liked it because it was different– not a magnet and not a post card. Good luck with planning!!
We did Paperless Post. It was the perfect way to save paper and money, and our guests loved it! You can easily personalize it to fit your photos, overall look, etc. and you don’t have to worry about guests misplacing it. For our guests that don’t check email regularly, we made printed versions of the same card and sent it via snail mail.
We did Paperless Post too for both our STD’s and invites. I know lots of people think that electronic is still not acceptable, but those type of people are not our friends, so everyone loved them! They are so cute, with the little envelope and everything. Super cheap, looked awesome, and in-line with our tree hugging ways (and what we saved on STDs and invites went into the open bar fund, which was a huge hit)
Oh and another plus is that the site has a tracking feature on it so you know whether people received it (or if the message was bounced) as well as when they opened it. I loved stalking PP and seeing who looked at them – much less stress than wondering if they arrived in someone’s mailbox.
I really like the postcard idea.
We did post card.. sans pictures because I was too excited and wanted to mail them out before we got our engagement photos.
I kind of wish I waited. I also kind of wish I didn’t do post cards. Post cards are not first class mail – so if the address is wrong or something weird happens (I double checked, but you never know)… they won’t be returned to you. We have no idea if there are people who didn’t receive them!
Oh, that proposal one is adorable. Love it.
Most of my friends have done magnets, but I just got a postcard one last week! Both seem simple and practical; can’t go wrong!
The proposal one was by far my favorite, those pictures were so cute! My brother and sister-in-law just sent out simple cards with their picture and the save the date information, honestly I think that’s good enough. There are other places you might want to put your money!
Wow I love the vintage postcard one! That’s is so cute! I did a postcard for mine too, it was drawing of a whale and it had “Save the Whales” written on it with “Whales” crossed out and “Date” written below it. We got a lot of feedback that it was funny and some other feedback that people didn’t get it lol.
I hand made mine using stuff from a scrapbook shop. I you want something original though why not make race bib save the dates? Maybe even relate it back to the Ragnar when you were proposed to? (I think it was Ragnar?)
Original and personal.
We did online RSVPs, so we decided to do an online save the date, too. My husband is a video editor, so we actually had a save the date video…it was pretty awesome.
We got married in a library so we used bookmarks for our save the dates. The top said “You’re booked!” and they were so cute! I found them on etsy. I think a couple older people were confused though.. either expecting a magnet or not understanding the concept of a save the date in the first place. Oops!
Oh my gosh that is so cute!
Save the Dates are so cute and creative!
I love the idea of magnets! I think it’s cute but I like the postcard idea too, and if it’s cheaper, I’d say go for that! People can stick it up on their fridge anyway
I like the magnets – but agree – they’re everywhere! I seriously am lovin’ those postcards though. Love!
I see mine on there! I didn’t realize how small it was!
I don’t think we sent out STD cards. Our wedding was one week after my In-laws anniversary so most people were aware of that and planned on that. (First day of Summer)
I made our Save the Date cards on Snapfish.com, and added the magnets myself (bought them in a roll at JoAnn’s for a few dollars). Affordable and cute!
This is a serious question: Why do couples even NEED Save the Dates? I mean, you already know what your wedding date is, and it’s less than a year away. So why not just send out the invitation?
I’m asking this because back when I got married (only 6.5 years ago!) Save the Dates didn’t even exist yet! So I really am curious about why couple use them now.
Those are all so cute!! I think my favorite is the postcard! So cute!
Love the magnet idea — so practical
I made my invitations in the form of a bookmark, with a heartshaped charm attached with a piece of ribbon matching our wedding color – I handmade all the invitations. This was a good idea for me,as everyone could keep the invites in their Bibles,diaries or also put on the fridge,since it’s not a big piece of paper.
You’ve just made my day. I got married in 2006 and used Save the Date magnets. I was ahead of my time!
I used a youtube video with a link to our wedding website as well. Hardly any of our guests were traveling and most knew about the event so I didn’t want to spend the $$ on STDs. I ended up going all DIY on my invites!
That vintage postcard is super cute!
I love the coasters, so cute!!
In the past month I’ve gotten one magnet and one postcard. I liked them both, though I will say that even the postcard ended up on my fridge, which meant I had to find a magnet to put it up.
I did magnets and used magnetstreet.com. If you go the magent route, I highly recommend – you’re able to upload and adjust your photo, change colors & fonts and customize pretty much every aspect of the STD before ordering. Some other sites I looked at didn’t allow for you to upload and adjust the photo – you’d have to send it off and just let them fool with it. Also, our magnet STDs (magnet + card stock holder) weren’t too much more expensive for postage. We mailed out like, 100 (I think?) and it was only about 50-60 bucks to mail?
Good luck with picking! You really can’t go wrong with any of them!
So late to this post — but my brother and his fiance had their save the dates hand drawn and they are adorable! It’s a “postcard” with a map of the US. It includes all the important spots for their relationship and the mileage away from Orlando (where they live) — where they went to college w/mascots (he went to FSU, she went UF), where they got engaged (NYC), and where they are getting married (Sonoma Valley, CA). The back had their wedding info. I love that it wasn’t the standard magnet!
The magnet idea is pretty standard and classic, but it really is a good idea – after all it probably is just going to end up attached to their fridge somehow! I don’t think you can go wrong with that.
My vote is for either the stickers, or the postcards. Both are simple but unique ideas. Good point about the stickers maybe not being the right choice for a January wedding though.
I agree the magnet and postcards are the best. They aren’t too expensive, get your point across, and people can easily save and enjoy them on their fridge!
Just be careful if you decide to make your own photo magnets. I had a family member do that and it must have gotten wet or just rubbed off in the mail because the photo looked unrecognizable when we received it. I was bummed because I love hanging on to those photos!
I was all about the postcard idea [as seen on Wedding Paper Divas] until my mom brought up the concern that since they’re not in an envelope, they can easily get ruined :/ We ultimately decided to go with a card that features one of our engagement pictures and the date… It’s bigger than a traditional card, we chose a bright coral envelope [to stand out in the mail pile!], and it doesn’t require any additional postage- the same as a postcard!
So crazy that you posted the coaster save the date. I actually grew up with the bride who had these created, and my parents went to her wedding! I think they even saved the coasters!
The balloon and save the date on a string are adorable! But I’m with you, totally not practical.
We did postcards for ours–one of the big selling points was that postage would be sliced in half and we had a guest list of 240…
The postcard idea is my favorite. That’s what Isaac and I are planning to do at the moment, unless I find something better.
Hi,
I went to “junk shops” and found actual vintage postcards from MA and NH (where I’m from). I found a cute stamp and just hand wrote “Save the Date” on them. They’re one of my favorite things about our wedding.
I find Save the Dates totally over-rated… I sent out a paperless post to the most important people and let the rest get the wedding invite. It saves a ton of money to skip and is the least memorable part of the wedding… I’d so much rather spend on the actual day than on silly stationary (which isn’t even the invite!)
Since our wedding was out of the country, and lots of people were traveling, we took the post card route and had it filled with pictures of us and of Rio to entice people to come. I blogged about it here: http://carlarunstheworld.com/2010/05/19/wedding-talk-save-the-date/
Oh, and we used overnightprints, and they were only $20.
My brother and SIL did a magnet but rather than having it geared toward the wedding with the whole “save the date” it was an engagement photo of them with their wedding date on it — nothing else. It was simple and classic and didn’t scream wedding. I believe it came in a little card that save the date with the magnet inside as an added bonus!
I wouldn’t reccommend doing the post card, the last three that we have gotten have come with black marks all over them from the mail sorting services… I’m not sure how businesses get their cards out to people without black gunk and tears on them, but I’d look into it before doing it. I think i tmight be that you need to print it on a THICK and glossy paper, which won’t save you any money in the long run.
We are doing the balloons, even though they are “not practical”. Going to attach it to a card with the date and website on it that can go on the fridge for once the balloon dies. MUCH cheaper than the magnets in the long run! We are going to get a few magnets made just for the bridal party and parents, since they are the only ones who will realllly appreciate them and not just throw them away