How far in advance?

[TML1101]

My fiance and I are considering a beach/cruise wedding in St. Thomas.

 

How far in advance do you tell your guests who may want to go on the cruise with you?

 

I was thinking of sending out invitations in the next 3 or 4 months with details about the cruise, itinerary, etc... The wedding will be in March 2009.

 

Would it be tacky to send out invitations 18 months in advance? or would it be ok because of the circumstances?

[briseis23]

I had the same issue. I defied etiquette and sent my invitations one year out. I still did a Save The Date as well, but we only had a limited time to fill the rooms in our group reservation. I think it worked out well. We have 50 people who have reserved their rooms, and by booking early under our group they were able to save money. The rates have already gone up since February.

 

I would advise to just send your Save The Date cards now and then take your time to firm up the wedding details before sending the actual invitations.

[ChrissySDMT]

I agree with everything Gwen said above! We are getting married in November 2008, and since Princess hasn't released their itineraries yet (Friday they do, woo hoo!), we haven't been able to give out a firm date. When we got engaged however, we called/talked to all the family that would be interested in going to give them the heads up so they were able to start saving and planning for a vacation.

 

Once we get the actual cruise booked, we are sending out a newsletter that goes over pricing, TA's, dates...all the good stuff.

 

When we're a year in advance, I think we'll send out the save the date cards to everyone who has expressed interest in going.

 

Then I few months after that, we'll send out official invitations to those who are coming.

[briseis23]

We are also doing newsletters every couple months to keep people interested. You can go to www.cruisedeckplans.com to find ship layouts, photos, and info. I found it to be more useful than Carnival's website. Lifetime membership is like $12, and they cover most cruise lines and their ships.

[VABride110607]

We are getting married in November on AOS and we sent out our invites right after Christmas... we didn't recieve all the replys back but had a good idea of our 'commiters', our 'maybes' and our 'nos'. I say the earlier the better! It gives you a better idea of what people are planning and how you can better plan too!

[wdngcruz]

I'm getting married in February 2008 on RC. We finalized our decision and are going with a wedding planner in Cozumel rather than with Royal Romance. I just ordered my Save the Dates and they should get back to me the first week of July. I will probably do a 1-2 day turnaround. I want to add an insert with information regarding the cruise itinerary, etc. There wasn't room to put all that info on the actual Save the Dates with our pictures but I'm attaching some magnets (that have adhesive backing) to the cards. We have a group of rooms that are blocked through July 23rd. I think that the earlier you let your guests know the better. I will still send invitation 6-7 weeks before the ceremony.

[StlGal]

We contacted our very close family & friends as soon as my now husband proposed to let them know what we were planning on getting married, the cruise line, and possible dates (like a poster above Royal Caribbean had not released the dates at the time).

 

As soon as the cruise opened up our TA had reserved/held 12 cabins for us. We had our guests who had said they were definitely going call our TA and put down a deposit asap.

 

About 2 weeks later we sent out save the date invitations along with a save the date magnet with our names, dates, etc. We were so happy/surprised to see the magnets hanging on so many of our friends fridges! :)

 

Approximately 12 weeks before the cruise we sent out the official invitation.

 

We also launched a wedding website & sent out newsletters.

[TML1101]

Thanks everyone!

 

I think I will send out "save-the-date" magnets and include a memo with cruise details and such.

 

I saw another post about the wedding website, so I have also set one up! This should help with the planning and letting everyone know what is going on.

 

www.mywedding.com/taniaandjamie