Digital invitation for a christening: what it costs

Sixty names on a list, a christening six weeks out, and a printer's quote sitting on the kitchen table. The quote covers 50 cards. Envelopes are a separate line. So is printing each household's name. So is postage. Price up digital christening invitations and it's one figure: 29.99 EUR for a digital invitation, one payment, no subscription. You can build it and send it today from the catalogue.

Paper isn't the problem. The problem is the second layer of costs, the ones that only turn up after you've already paid for the first print run.

Printing 60 christening invitations: the costs that dodge the budget

Ask for the price at 60 units, not 50. Printers work in bands, and crossing a band moves the number up. Then there's everything the quote leaves out: the design, if you don't already have one; envelopes with each family's name on them; one stamp per address; and the cards that stay in a drawer because you never posted them. Add reprints, too. If the time moves, the venue changes or a godparent's name gets spelled wrong, that run is out of date and you pay for a second one.

• Paper and envelopes: get the quote at 60 units, then ask what a named envelope adds per household.
• Postage: one stamp per address, plus the re-sends for the cousin who moved last month.
• Reprints: what a second run costs if the time changes after the cards are printed.
• RSVP time: the messages and calls until you can give the restaurant a final number.

Replying by WhatsApp has a price, and you pay it in time

With 60 guests, one table of ten that doesn't answer is ten separate messages. And the answers land in different places: some by WhatsApp, some face to face over Sunday lunch, some second-hand from an aunt who's sure she told her sister.

If nobody keeps the list in one place, you end up writing names on the back of a receipt, or in your phone notes, the week of the christening. The caterer wants a number on Thursday, not a maybe. That's the cost that never appears on a quote: the evening you spend chasing people instead of closing the headcount.

Changing the christening time without reprinting a single card

If the service moves from 12:00 to 13:00, you edit the invitation and the link stays the same. Nobody opens an out-of-date version. Same for the venue, the map, the dress code or one line of text. No reprint, no second round of envelopes. Before you pay, you can try a design for free in test mode and edit the cover with live preview in the browser editor, with nothing to install.

You're not really buying 60 invitations. You're buying one link that's always current, and every reply in one list.

Why a digital invitation fits a christening budget

Do the maths with your own quotes: cards, envelopes, stamps and an evening of chasing replies, against 29.99 EUR for one page you can edit without reprinting anything. A digital invitation from Send The Joy is a one-off payment with no subscription, the confirmations arrive inside the invitation in one ordered list, and you can add up to six of your own photos and set the questions you want answered on the RSVP form. Pick a design from the collection and send it this week.