How to Import a Guest List Without Creating Forty Duplicates

Clean the spreadsheet first — it takes ten minutes

• One person per row, even for couples you plan to group later
• Separate first name and last name columns
• One email address per cell — "sam@x.com / partner@y.com" imports as neither
• Remove blank spacer rows, colour-coded headings and merged cells
• Standardise phone numbers with the country code if you intend to text

Which columns are worth mapping

Name and one contact method are the minimum. Beyond that, only import what you will actually use: dietary notes if you are catering, a group or side label if you plan to segment, and a household reference if your sheet already tracks families. Every other column is better re-created inside the tool than dragged along.

What "duplicate" really means on a guest list

Exact duplicates are easy. The ones that cause trouble are the near-misses: the same person under a maiden name, a work address and a personal address, "Bob" and "Robert". A good import will hold the obvious duplicates back and show you what it skipped rather than merging on a guess.

Inviterio imports up to 1,000 rows at a time and returns the result inline — how many were imported, how many were duplicates, how many were skipped and why — so you can fix the source rows and re-run rather than discovering the problem when two invitations arrive.

Import before you invite, always

Do the whole import, review it, fix it, and only then send. Invitations are the one step you cannot quietly undo — a duplicate invitation reaches a real person and has to be explained.

After the import

Group households, set plus-one permissions, and tag the obvious segments while the list is fresh in your mind. Ten minutes of structure at this point is what makes every later question — who is pending, who eats what, who sits where — a filter rather than a project.