Save Paper & Money With E-Vites and E-Cards

E-vites and E-cards are electronic cards which have been available for several years now. They can be a great way to reduce paper waste, and they can also save you money as well.  As more people become more environmentally conscious, electronic invitations and cards are growing in popularity. 

Here are a few benefits to e-vites and e-cards:

Wedding invitations. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

#1.  Less paper.  It is estimated that if everyone sent electronic cards and invitations instead of paper cards and invitations we’d save more than 200,000 trees each year.

#2.  You don’t have to spend money on stamps to send your invitations and cards, which quite often require additional postage.

#3.  They reduce the environmental cost of producing paper.  Paper not only means cutting down trees which are valuable to our environment, the production of paper also uses tremendous amounts of energy and resources - all of which contribute to our carbon footprint.  Cut back on greenhouse gases and use e-cards and e-invites.

#4.  No ink.  Unless your paper cards are printed with earth friendly and non-toxic ink, you’re much better off using an electronic option.  In addition, you don’t have to personally sign each card, once again saving ink.

#5.  There are no delivery costs.  When it comes to ordering invitations or buying cards, it takes a delivery truck and/or airplane to get them to you - whether they’re being shipped to the store where you buy them or you order them and they’re being shipped to you. Electronic cards do not need to be shipped anywhere.  This means you save fuel costs and emissions. 

E-Card Drawbacks?

When it comes to e-cards, the only real drawback is that while the majority of people use their email on an almost daily basis, not everyone is on email. If you’re sending out wedding invitations for example, there is a very good chance your older relatives do not have email addresses. And even if they do, sometimes your card may get caught in someone's spam filter and they may never see it.  However, in many cases you can pick a few people you would want to receive paper invitations and send the bulk of your list an email invite, dramatically cutting back on costs and saving resources.

So where do you get e-cards and invitations?

E-cards and e-invites can all be found online.  There are generally a few basic options:

Halloween-E-Card (Photo credit: brookeduckart)

* Membership sites where you register for free and can then send cards and invites.  Some cards may even be available for free.  And there are customization options so you can change the design, wording and information to reflect your needs.

* Freebie sites that don’t require registration.  These sites are great for the occasional e-card.  However, they typically do not allow for much customization.

* Paid sites requiring a subscription. Generally, the subscription is an annual one, it’s relatively low cost and you do receive a good degree of customization options.

E-cards and e-vites are growing in popularity, not only because of their convenience but also because they’re a very sustainable practice, and they save money.  When you combine these three benefits, and the wide variety of card and invitation options, it’s easy to choose the electronic option and reduce your paper waste as well as cost.