You are engaged and cannot wait to tell the world. Perhaps you have dreamed about your wedding story and photograph being in the newspaper – the traditional way to announce your good news to extended family members, friends and school mates.
Engagement and wedding announcements are clipped and saved for many years, and sometimes placed in scrapbooks and kept for generations.
However, before you sit down to write a Pulitzer-Prize-winning story of your love, read your local paper to see what information it uses for such articles.
Unless the couple, the parents and grandparents all live in the same area, the bride-to-be, or her agent, may need to deal with several newspapers. An agent for a bride is usually one of the mothers of the couple, the wedding director or a maid or matron of honor.
You may already know the newspapers in which your mother will want to publish the announcement, but what about your grandmother, or the groom’s grandmother?
Perhaps a bride has no interest in having her story published. It is an individual preference. However, a newspaper story might be very important to the older generation(s) in the family
This is why it is a good idea to enlist the help of your mother and the groom’s mother. If they live in different towns, let each handle the actual work of submitting the stories and photographs to the paper(s) she prefers.
While the information used in some community newspapers is detailed, the task of collecting the information does not have to be daunting. In this age of computers, the workload will be fairly light and can be spread over time.
Newspapers Have Guidelines and Deadlines the Bride Must Meet in Order to Have a Wedding Story Published
You will find that the format of wedding and engagement stories remains constant within each individual newspaper, but varies widely from one paper to another.
The newspapers publish guidelines or rules for submission, which are also available at the newspaper’s website, along with fill-in-the-blank forms. You supply the details, and someone at the newspaper will write the announcement for you. If in doubt, call the newspaper for personal assistance.
Once the bride knows in which newspapers the families wish the engagement and wedding stories to be published, she should get the forms and check to see what information she will need as it varies greatly from one paper to another. If you plan to publish your stories in more than one paper, obtain the submission guidelines for them all because the rules at each newspaper will be different.
Each newspaper will have its own deadline for articles submitted, its own costs or lack of, and its own way of formatting and publishing the information.
In a huge newspaper, such as The New York Times, not every announcement is published. Space limits the number chosen to be published.
The Washington Post publishes announcements as “paid advertisements” and details the couple's love story.
Some newspapers charge fees: one for the story or content and another fee if you wish to publish a photograph. Some papers offer brides a choice of a one column photo for a certain amount and a two-column photo for a larger amount.
It is the bride’s responsibility to know and meet the requirements and deadline of the individual newspaper.
Preparing the Forms to Have Your Engagement / Wedding Story Published in the Newspaper
The bride-to-be needs to talk with her mother and the groom’s mother to get the correct spellings of the names of the couple’s grandparents and great-grandparents and where they live(d). Signify by using “late” or “deceased” with the name of anyone to whom it applies.
Many newspapers will include grandparent and some will include great-grandparent information in the announcements. Once the bride has collected all the information required, she passes it along to the papers she is dealing with herself and on to whoever is handing the details for other newspapers.
Details for After-the-Wedding Stories Can Be Collected During the Planning Process
If the bride is dealing with a community newspaper that still does stories that include decorative details as well as names of the wedding party, she should keep a document on her computer or as a draft in her e-mail of all the information as she makes her plans.
After contracting with the florist, a bride can jot down information for both the sanctuary decorations and the reception.
For the wedding, write the number and types of candelabra that will be used, an arch if used, kneeling bench, and the flowers that will be used to decorate the church – colors and types of plants or flowers. Include such information as whether an aisle cloth will be used, what type of pew markers and how the windows will be decorated.
For the reception, include the location, what tablecloths will be used – color(s) and whether overlays or runners will be used. If the food tables are decorated differently from the guest tables, note that.
Decorative details for the couple’s table should have a separate paragraph if you wish to include that detail.
Make sure centerpieces are described as well as decorations for the reception hall.
Details for the bridal cake and groom's cake should be listed as soon as you have contracted with the caterer.
As the prenuptial parties are held, keep a list – party type (shower, pounding, girls’ weekend, bachelor party and so forth), date, where the party was held and who the hosts were.
While this may sound like complicated information, some community newspapers continue to give local brides (or those with local connections) this type of big story.
A bride-to-be who lives in a bigger town will most likely not need all this information. However, some of the couple’s parents or grandparents may, so a bride-to-be can just record all the information after each planning session.
Then, prior to the wedding day, it is a simple matter to e-mail all the information to the person(s) who will be dealing directly with the newspapers for her.
What to Do If Your Photographer Won’t Have the Photographs Finished in Time to Meet the Newspapers’ Deadlines
Busy photographers may take longer to work the hundreds of photographs than the newspapers’ deadlines will allow.
A bride has a few options:
- Do a pre-wedding bridal portrait of just the bride. This is the traditional way, and all the information can be submitted to the newspaper before the wedding even happens or certainly ahead of the deadline.
- If you prefer to have both the bride and the groom in the photograph, arrange with the photographer to rush one photograph, by e-mail, selected just for the newspaper. Digital images are the best because there is not the hassle of having a photo printed and the leg-work of delivering the photograph to the newspaper. In addition, the quality of the image in the newspaper depends on what is submitted. Photographs on textured paper may look great, but when the photograph is scanned, the texture shows and the image is degraded. So, if an actual photograph is being submitted, be sure it is printed by a good printer on glossy paper, not a quick copy on regular paper on your little home printer.
- With so many good cameras owned by so many people, it is likely that someone among the bride’s friends will have an adequate camera. Have a good friend get several shots of the bride and the groom by themselves. Then, the friend can e-mail the photos to the bride.
While your professional photographer will work the photographs, it is not a requirement and there is no reason for the bride's friend(s) to worry about working the photographs. Each newspaper has a department that works photos for publication. The un-worked digital images can be submitted by e-mail.
With thought and planning, a bride can have all the information for her wedding story submitted to a number of newspapers without too much anxiety or time-consuming work. She will easily meet the newspapers' deadlines and have a record of her wedding day to cherish for years to come.
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Velma Southerland - Velma Southerland has been employed in the lifestyles section of an award-winning East Tennessee community newspaper for more than 20 ...
