Where to print custom wedding invitation?

June 16, 2008 1:25 PM

Where to print custom wedding invitations online?

Has anyone had any experience with any online printing places? I'm going to print about 100 wedding invitations. The wedding invitation will have a photo on it. I'm having a graphic designer friend of my mine help with that, I'm just wondering where to print it, and what format the printer would be looking for? Has anyone had any experience with something like this?

posted by patrickje to computers & internet (8 comments total)

My wife has an invitation business. I can tell you from her previous frustration, online printers are not the way to go. I can almost guarantee you that your colors will come back wrong regardless of what is shown on the digital preview, especially if you are printing on fancy paper. You should look into finding a local printer and visit them in person if you want to avoid a horrible headache.
posted by fusinski at 1:38 PM on June 16

I just got married three weeks ago. I was looking to do most of the stuff myself and not have a huge tab - basically graphic looking, relaxed, inexpensive but definitely not 'cheap looking'

In January, I ordered my invites from here:
http://www.weddingpaperdivas.com/

(I edited some stuff off them for web-ready page so might not be 100% centered - my fault - but:
http://i255.photobucket.com/albums/hh135/vicious_hordelicious/wed_invite.jpg)

I think it came out to about $350 or so for 75 invites, RSVP notes and thank you notes... I received them in two weeks and they came out amazing - just what I wanted! Unique, graphic, slightly quirky and definitely NOT looking like they were "home printed," which was my main problem with Etsy sellers (besides being twice the price without including thank you notes). I can't tell you how many compliments I've received on them and I let it slide when people assume I 'designed' them myself. :)

There are a ton of different types from traditional to contemporary like I had and you can edit / compose all the copy yourself or take from their templates. I think they can also accommodate your photo request.

Congrats and I hope this helps! Planning a wedding nearly gave me constant heartburn, lol.
posted by eatdonuts at 1:41 PM on June 16

If I use a local printer (Seattle area) what should I bring with me?
posted by patrickje at 1:41 PM on June 16

Well, you should call them first because they will dictate to you how best to present them with the design. Typically they like them in CMYK and around 300 DPI, but accept a variety of file formats. What you need to be careful about is asking them what the bleed and trim dimensions are for the paper size you want so your designer friend can get the file dimensions right and you don't end up, for instance, cutting the top of your head off in the photo. :)
posted by fusinski at 1:48 PM on June 16

We went with a combination of printers, since we wanted to do limited letterpress and then standard printing for the rest. For the letterpress, we went with Evolution Press in Ballard, and I think they just wanted the PDFs of the files.

For the invitation printing, we worked with Zebra Printing in Bellevue, and they initially wanted PDF files, but I there was some compatibility issue with the way they were output in PDF, so we wound up providing Adobe Illustrator .AI files and the font files for them to work with. It also helped that we knew what Pantone colors we wanted, so the color matching issue wasn't a problem. Having a photo might complicate things and will probably move you away from offset printing, but the owner of Zebra was pretty helpful for us (his workers, not so much helpful) in making sure we got everything right.
posted by curse at 1:57 PM on June 16

If your friend is a designer and will be helping you then you should ask her opinion. Designer's usually find it much easier to handle printing themselves since they know how to spec the project, get quotes and design it around your budget. Your friend should have contacts in the printing industry that are worth looking at. I once hand-cut 250 odd-sized envelopes for a friend's wedding. Never again!
posted by Bunglegirl at 2:28 PM on June 16

For our wedding invites, we took it to the local copy shop. We did a concert poster like invite on a glossy paper, so it was just easier to go local.

An online option is Vista Print, but if you go that route know that they put their logo on the back of everything they print unless you call and specifically tell them that you don't want the logo. For our thank you cards it wasn't a big deal, and they were pretty cheap but still of a good quality.
posted by mcroft at 5:26 PM on June 16

My Vistaprint wedding invitations and announcements turned out fantastic. Sign up for their mailing list with a throwaway account and you'll get fantastic clickthrough deals every few days. We didn't get a logo on the back, but then again, we paid the extra buck or whatever to have a personalized back. A bunch of invitations, announcements, envelopes, address labels, and other miscellanea only cost us $50 or so.
posted by sian at 5:34 PM on June 16