Home

Etiquette

Our Etiquette Guideline Statement

Let Paper Affair guide you through a sticky situation by following some of our simple and practical etiquette tips. We’ve taken the majority of the etiquette directly from Crane’s Blue Book of Stationery. We feel they are the etiquette authority within the realm of stationery and correspondence.

Still, it's important to remember that etiquette is not the law. It was established to help make difficult situations more comfortable. If a tip we offer does not leave you with a good feeling, by all means, follow your instincts. But we will always advise you as to what etiquette dictates and then bow to your wishes if you want otherwise.

The Essence of Etiquette

authored by Crane's

Etiquette can be defined as the body of rules of social conduct that tells us what our society considers appropriate and acceptable behavior. Adherence to these guidelines can help make our personal and professional relationships more comfortable and effective. We tend to feel more at ease when we understand what others expect of us.

The etiquette that we follow when sending a letter or invitation, like etiquette in other areas, revolves around three basic building blocks: Common sense, courtesy, and usage.

Etiquette’s foundation is common sense. On an invitation, for example, there is essential information that must be conveyed if you want your guests to show up at your event. Your guests need to know who is inviting them to what function. They also need to know the date, time, and place. A properly worded invitation contains all of that information and presents it succinctly and coherently.

Courtesy is the spirit of etiquette. Its inherent generosity makes for better and more rewarding relationships. Courtesy imposes on us an obligation to be considerate of others. Within our suggestions, you may come across some guidelines that you feel might not work in your situation. If you followed those guidelines, you might, perhaps, offend someone you love. You may feel that your relationship with that person is more important than the wording of your invitation. When that is the case, courtesy demands that you find an alternative. Etiquette is proper only when it facilitates and strengthens relationships.

The third building block is usage. Etiquette has evolved over the years and will continue to evolve. Many of the customs that were proper fifty years ago are anachronisms now — a gentleman tipping his hat comes to mind. Likewise, many of the customs we practice today will be outdated fifty years from now.

As old customs become obsolete, new ones take their place. Reply cards, for example, were, not very long ago, considered improper, even offensive and insulting. Wedding invitations were always answered in one’s own handwriting on one’s own stationery. As our lives became busier and busier, many of us no longer had the time to sit down and handwrite a reply. Since hosts and hostesses could not risk not receiving responses, they began to send reply cards with their invitations. This made it easier for their guests to respond. The courtesy extended to their guests was a common sense approach to the problem of late and never received responses. As more and more invitations were sent with reply cards, reply cards became more and more acceptable. Today, they are sent with almost every wedding invitation.

In other words, at some point the traditional way of responding to wedding invitations was not working. Common sense suggested that a solution be developed. The solution was simple: Extend to guests the courtesy of providing them with an easy to use card with a stamped, pre-addressed envelope. This solution worked and through its usage reply cards have now become perfectly proper.

These three building blocks — common sense, courtesy, and usage — are the basis for all the guidelines that social etiquette provides.