Remember when the Schuylkill River experienced historic flooding, taking out entire areas of Center City Philadelphia, 76, and interrupting life around the city for days? We sure do! And not just because it was crazy. We were working with a number of couples that weekend and had our eyes GLUED to the forecast and the subsequent flooding. Thankfully, only one of our couples was directly impacted, but that still meant that after years of planning, one couple was shifting plans at the eleventh hour because of the historic flooding.
Whether it’s a natural disaster, personal emergency, or a change in the availability of a priority family member, your special date may have to shift. So now that you have an updated wedding date, what can you do? Now it’s time to let everyone know what’s going on. But how? We have a few suggestions for letting folks know about your rescheduled wedding!
First off, your timing for changing your wedding date will dramatically impact the way you need to communicate your plans. If you’re recently engaged and had a theoretical date in mind that had to shift because your MUST HAVE wedding venue just wasn’t available, that’s a much easier thing to communicate than someone who is making the change at the last minute. But no matter the situation, you can do this and celebrate as planned with all your key people!
Put Your Planner to Work
This is one of those moments when couples who are already working with a planner are at an advantage. You have a heavy hitter in your back pocket. Your wedding planner will not only be ready to start working behind the scenes on your new plan for the best day ever, but they can also help with organizing a communication plan and disseminating the information to key people.
Your planner can one-on-one with your stationer, reach out to the other pros on your wedding team, and come up with a step-by-step action plan for what responsibilities fall on your head. So if you have a planner already in your corner, you can probably skip the rest of these details. But if not, read on for some of our fast tips to mobilize your guest list to your new plan!
Share Your New Wedding Date Digitally
One of the fastest and easiest ways to let a large number of folks know what changes have been made to your wedding day is to use the internet. If you have a wedding website, you can update the information there first and email your guests accordingly. You can create a Facebook group where you post updated information and invite updated rsvps. You can even make a Typeform to gather any updated rsvps for easy tracking and use.
There are a few drawbacks to this. Most elderly folks aren’t on social media and may not have access to email. Those who would be ill-served by this method may require a phone call or new invitation in the mail. Speaking of.
Call Your Guest List To Let Them Know Your Updated Wedding Date
Depending on the size of your guest list or the kind of changes you’ve made to your wedding day, a phone call may be the best option. This would give you a chance to connect with everyone directly to update them on the new plan and get their verbal (and immediate) rsvp. Don’t forget to reach out to guests who may have initially rsvp’ed “no.” Because of the changes they may now be able to attend your wedding!
If you have a big list and need to pull in back up – call upon the mothers! Your mother and future mother-in-law probably want to do anything they can to help!
Send Updated Wedding Invitations or Change-the-Dates
Send a new round of invitations if it’s in your budget to do so. Even an “on-brand” postcard with the rescheduled wedding date and any updated information they’ll need, inviting guests to email or call you with their RSVP. Make sure to save a few for posterity along with your original invitation.
This is also a great chance to let your personality and sense of humor shine. Possibly send your original invite with the initial date crossed out and the new one plastered on top. A 90’s callback to “psych!” Have fun and make the most of it! Which brings us to our final point.
Get excited again!
It’s been a trying time for you as you’ve dealt with the headache, hassle, and heartbreak of rescheduling a day you’ve been looking forward to for a long time. But, we’d like to encourage you to get excited about that magical day again. This may not have been the way you wanted to see it go down, but it’s going to be amazing and awesome! You’ll make incredible memories, celebrate with people who care about you, and marry your best friend. Plus, you’ll have one hell of a story. And is there anything better than that?
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