The Green Kangaroo - Unique Wedding Invitations and Stationery

Customers and friends alike often ask us how The Green Kangaroo got its unusual name. When we learned that some of our dear employees didn’t even know the answer to this query, we thought a blog posting was in order to explain ourselves!

We were inspired with our quirky moniker by our appreciation for Judy Blume’s first published book, The One in the Middle is the Green Kangaroo. This funny story about a kid struggling to express his uniqueness and individuality had always spoken to our own journeys of trying to “fit in.” When we were preparing to launch our line of completely customizable invitations and stationery, the reference to “The Green Kangaroo” seemed to fit our mission of embracing each customer’s personal style and creativity and of working with design ideas that don’t “fit in” to the templates of traditional stationers.

These years later, the name has proven to fit our unconventional approach to the stationery business. And its light-hearted tone helps us keep our focus on the fun and beautiful artisanship that we love so much about what we do.

Are you a Green Kangaroo?

This month, we decided to liven things up a little. Summer is ripe for wedding ceremonies, and as such, our programs and table stationery (i.e. table cards, place cards, and menus) dominate in product popularity. We are going to kick off the 2009 summer season with a promo on our wedding programs.

This is no ordinary promotion. Pay careful attention because there are tight timelines, and to be fair to everyone involved, we have to play by the rules. The promotion is a straight discount – a certain percentage off your wedding program order. However, the discount DECREASES each week in June.

Here’s the June 2009 Promo schedule:

Other than the date you actually confirm your order online (i.e. the date on your receipt), there are no strings attached to this offer! Simply buy your wedding ceremony programs using the coupon code below, and you’ll get a discount!

Coupon Code: ACTFAST0609

• This offer is only valid on products listed under Wedding Programs
• The date your order is placed will correspond with one of 4 weeks listed above, and the applicable discount will automatically be applied during checkout when you use the coupon code *ACTFAST0609

The Green Kangaroo strikes again!! Two news spots in the same week! ABC Channel 11 News Super Saver Thursdays featured ways to get a “magazine” styled wedding look for less. Wedding planner Karen Clark, owner of Something Borrowed, Something Blue discussed ways to get similar but less expensive table decor, wedding cakes and yes – wedding invitations – from the Green Kangaroo. The invitations featured were our Coast Couture Ava invitation (average price $14.75 each), our Claudia invitation with a coastal theme (average price $7.20 each) and our Coastal Abby invitation (average price $4.50 each). Check out the video!

Don’t forget ladies – we want you to have wedding invitations that have your guests saying “that is so you”. We also don’t want you living on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for your first year of wedded bliss because you spent more than you could afford on your special day. If you love our style, but we are just out of your price range – STAY TUNED! We will be launching our much anticipated Fresh and Frugal Collection at the end of this week! Want a sneak peek?

Happy Tuesday!

We just learned that one of our favorite bridal magazines, Weddings Unveiled has partnered with Vera Wang to give away a gorgeous made-to-order Vera Wang dress!!

How can YOU be the winner? Check out their blog to learn more.

Hurry . . . they are announcing the winner on Friday, May 22nd!

Hi Ladies – hope this Friday is treating you well!

We wanted to share with everyone that TGK was featured in a recent newspaper article about how brides can take advantage of the current economic “times” to get married for less. The article, in Raleigh’s News and Observer, talks about ways that business owners are helping brides to plan weddings that are beautiful, yet gentle on the pocketbook. The article mentions The Green Kangaroo’s very popular DIY option in which we assist brides in designing and professionally printing their wedding invitations, then allowing them to complete the assembly themselves – saving roughly 15%.

Read more (and even see photos of some TGK employees!) on the News & Observer website.

Happy Friday!

Behold – the envelope! Envelopes don’t seem to get a whole lot of attention, but for those who understand their importance, you know the kind of excitement that is evoked when you receive something extraordinary in your mailbox. And that kind of excitement starts with the envelope!

Our May 2009 Promo

For the month of May, TGK is providing free color upgrades on return addresses and reply envelopes for all wedding invitation orders. We always print your return address on the back flap of your outer envelope, but our standard “no cost” default is black ink. If you select a colored ink for your invitation, now is your chance to add a little pop to your design without adding any $. Simply select the “Free Color Upgrade” for both your Reply Address and Return Address on the Design Options tab, and voila! Our Design Team will create coordinating and complimentary envelopes for your invitations in matching colors.

Add even more WOW to your invite with a coordinating envelope pattern and guest addressing – only $2.25/each when purchased together or $1.50/each when purchased separately.

Hurry! This offer will “disappear” on May 31st, 2009. Exclusions apply.

Free Notes with all Pocket Orders in April!

Our note card promotion is back by popular demand. Every pocket order placed between April 1 and April 30 is eligible for your choice of free matching note cards, favor tags, or place cards. Simply make your selection in the “Design Extras” tab when you are customizing your order.

Hurry! This offer expires on April 30, 2009. exclusions apply – see below

Since 2009 rolled around, The Green Kangaroo has really been “hopping”, so we decided to reward ourselves by a night out. With spouses in tow, the Green Kangaroo team headed to Mez, North Carolina’s first LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) designed restaurant.

We chose this restaurant because A.) WE LOVE MEXICAN!! and B.) It received great online reviews – and we were NOT disappointed! The service was great and the food was nothing short of outstanding! Mez serves traditional Mexican recipes with a modern (even healthy!) twist. If you are looking for a restaurant with fabulous food and a cool atmosphere, you should check out Mez.

We want to say thanks to Jamie LaForce, general manager, and the staff of Mez for making our much deserved night so awesome! Muchas Gracias!!

A simple blog entry can not express how proud we are of our full page feature in the May/June 2009 issue of Brides Magazine.

Our Couture Collection performed exceptionally well in March, and we can only hope that its success will continue with such positive exposure!

The May/June 2009 issue of Brides Magazine is a great read, and is currently on newstands nationwide. You can find our Couture Coastal Ava on page 150.

Thank you to the wonderful staff, editors and photographers at Brides Magazine!

Another win for TGK! Yay!

New Hydrangea Invite!

Okay, okay already! We hear you! After countless requests, TGK finally launched our new Hydrangea Wedding Invitation! We chose to adorn our Audrey Pocket with this colorful and romantic Hydrangea sketch, created by one of TGK’s very own designers, Katie Graf. Katie is loaded with lots a great ideas and talent, so be on the lookout for more wonderful designs from Katie!

Hydrangeas are popular flowers for wedding bouquets and centerpieces. Their full blossoms and indigenous habitat make them a cost effective choice, but don’t let that fool you! Hydrangeas are highly sought after flowers for their beauty and fragrance. You may pay a little more per stem than – say a gerber daisy, but a little goes a long way! TheKnot.com has an entire gallery dedicated to Hydrangeas!

Our new Hydrangea Pocket Invitation was inspired by a couple getting married on the Seattle coast. They were fun to work with and gave our design team a lot of latitude in creating this one-of-a-kind wedding invitation! All of our pocket invitations include the invitation, a reply postcard, and 2 accessory cards for a convenient, organized, and stylish invitation. We even have a unique DIY option that gives you the benefit of a professionally designed and printed invitation,but with the cost savings that come with putting it together yourself! Selecting the “DIY Option” on any of the applicable Signature Wedding Invitations from TGK will save about 15% on your total invitation cost – not too shabby!

Free Notes with all Pocket Orders in April!

Our note card promotion is back by popular demand. Every pocket order placed between April 1 and April 30 is eligible for your choice of free matching note cards, favor tags, or place cards. Simply make your selection in the “Design Extras” tab when you are customizing your order. Hurry! This offer expires on April 30, 2009. exclusions apply – see below

March came in – and went out – like a Lion!

It was truly March Madness at The Green Kangaroo this year! We had lots of rain at TGK… and lots of “green” invitation orders! Thanks to all of our customers who ordered “green” in March. A local animal rescue organization will be the lucky recipient of a nearly $1000 donation check! That’s impressive!

Frustrated because you couldn’t access the TGK site over the weekend? We were too! In the 5 years that we’ve been online, this was definitely a first! We’ve experienced downtime before, but it typically was on the order of a few minutes and still very rare – nothing of this magnitude.

We want our customers to know that we’ve taken steps to make sure this doesn’t happen again. Rest assured that your personal information, saved favorites, shopping carts, etc… were not compromised. The site was down due to a severe technical failure (that is too complicated to explain any further!).

We’re back up and running this Monday morning, and all is right with the world again! To make up for your inconvenience, we’re offering a special one-time discount of 10% off your order through next Sunday, March 22, 2009. Enter coupon code: sitedown0309 at check out to receive your discount. Exclusions apply.

Thank you for your patience and understanding, and welcome back to www.tgkdesigns.com!

Discount expires Sunday, March 22, 2009. Discount does not apply to orders containing only DIY products.

It’s March Madness at The Green Kangaroo! With St. Patrick’s Day just around the corner, and the promise of Spring in the air, TGK is ready to celebrate!!

In the true spirit of fun and luck, we are honoring all things GREEN during the month of March!

Our community is very important to us, so The Green Kangaroo is giving back… to a local non-profit in our own backyard! TGK will donate 5% of all “green” sales during the month of March to a local animal rescue.

Help build our fund by ordering something “green” – literally! Green orders contain one or more of the following:

• green ink
• green paper
• green ribbon
• green embellishments

Orders must be submitted online or in-store between March 1 and March 31, 2009.

New GREEN Designs – TGK will be springing fresh new designs each week in March! Join in the fun by sending your design suggestions to invites@tgkdesigns.com. If we use your idea, we’ll give you kudos!

As you all may well know, we promised to deliver 5 or more new Save the Date designs during the month of January. What you may not know is that just as we all were saying farewell to the month of January, our Design Team snuck in 5 new designs on the very last day (i.e. the 31st). If you haven’t already taken a peek at them, you should!

Most notable… 3 of the 5 designs were postcards – an easy and design savvy way to save a little $ on your wedding stationery and at the post office!

My favorites – the Dandelion Postcard and the Madison Postcard Save the Dates!

TGK recommends that your order your Save the Dates 6 to 12 months before your wedding.

Am I the only one totally depressed by the fact that I can’t turn on the TV without hearing how hard the financial times are right now? I was doing a little research and typed in the word “Eco” on Google and “Economic Crisis” was the 6th word in their search suggestions list – crazy!!

For all those brides out there planning a wedding during the current “economic crisis” – making savvy financial choices is more important than ever. The ladies here at The Green Kangaroo totally sympathize, and have quite a few options when it comes to helping brides save on their wedding stationery.

1. Do-it-yourself . . . all-the-way-baby!!

This option is for those brides who want to swap bucks for time (and maybe a few gray hairs). After having a number of brides inquire about buying our exclusive pockets so they can print and assemble their wedding invitations themselves, we launched the DIY portion of our website. Here you will find pockets, printing paper, envelopes, ribbon, adhesive, etc. to print and assemble your own wedding invitations.

2. DIY . . . gimme the burger, but hold the bun!!

Our most popular DIY option – this option is available on any wedding invitation that involves assembly. For instance – our Josie Claire pocket invitation is $7.20 each for 100 pockets, which normally arrive fully assembled – but if you choose to layer the invites to the pockets yourself, you save $1.10 each (that’s a 110 bucks!). The great part about this option is that your wedding invites will be professionally printed and you don’t have to wrestle with your printer at home to print (then cut all those pieces!).

3. I’m a designer and I’ve already “done it” . . . now I need help producing my perfect wedding invite!!

One of the most rewarding aspects of working at The Green Kangaroo is the collaboration between the bride and our design staff to put her ideas on paper. Though this is not what you typically think of when one says, DIY, we have lots of graphic designer brides (or grooms-to-be) work with us in order to produce totally custom (and professionally printed) wedding invitation ensembles. And though this does not directly save money, what you have is a HUGE bang for your buck (aka VALUE).

We will be talking about this further in future blogs, so stay tuned!

6 new Photo Save the Dates…

...were added to The Green Kangaroo 2009 Save the Date Collection!

Save the Dates from TGK are a great way to announce your big day! Check out our 6 new designs (inspired by our Holiday Collection) that can be personalized with your favorite photo of you and your fiance!

Bangle – Bliss – Circles & Dots – Damask – Floral Decor – Tropical Palm

Remember, we’re launching 5 new Save the Dates each week in January.

Stay tuned for Week 2!