The foundations

One system, built to hold real content and real logos.

I explored solutions: trimming copy and images on the existing structure was the fastest to ship, but it treated symptoms, not the container — it would have bought a year before the same problems came back. I rejected keeping separate mobile and desktop templates outright: it doubles creative production per client, and every fix has to be made twice, which is exactly the divergence that caused the rendering bugs in the first place.

Instead, I defined one fluid template, 375–600px, built from tiered modules: real product imagery where it earns its space, more offers in the same scroll where it doesn't, and one consistent anatomy underneath so repetition reads as rhythm instead of noise. Not four modules — one. Standard is the base; Marquee and Bulletin add a merchandise image; Tier 4 drops the offer entirely — four priced tiers from a single component, at a fraction of the dev lift. Each module is built as one flexible container that expands from mobile to desktop, keeping content fixed and legible at any viewport size.

But I also had another big problem. The primary content of the email is merchant logos, and the existing merchant logo database of 1,100+ logos was full of broken, cropped, or invisible-on-dark-mode renders that included a white bounding box in their export. They looked horrible and made our emails look untrustworthy. I pushed to rebuild it from the existing SVG library dev already maintained on-site, using an AI automation pass to export clean, email-safe transparent PNGs. That gave every module a logo that renders cleanly on any background, which is what made theming, dark modules, and the circle affordance possible everywhere else.

↻ Replay

A closer look

Module 1: Merchant offer, with image

The top of the send and the most expensive placement on the rate card. It has one job: earn attention in the first three seconds.

Module 2: Merchant offer, without product image

The tier that carries most sends. The old one left empty space below every offer; the redesign uses a fixed height that always looks full, so roughly three fit where one used to.

Module 3: Merchant logo only

A compact, image-free grid for long-scroll sends — no offer copy, no dates, nothing to go stale. Structurally it's Standard with the offer stripped out: same component, less content, so imagery is never required for a module to hold up.

A bonus tracker should track the bonus.

Members earn a "bonus" in their program's currency for hitting a spend threshold within a promo period, on top of their regular loyalty earnings — the tracker's job is to emphasize the bonus amounts and let members know, at a glance, what they've earned. Marketing wanted the spend amount to lead — that's how bonuses had always been presented. I wanted the bonus miles to lead because that's the number a member has already banked; it's proof of progress, not a demand. Gamify what a member has already earned and they keep going; lead with what they still need to spend and it reads like a bill. The debate turned out to be about hierarchy, not content — earned miles take the headline; the spend amount sits right beneath it, phrased as the next action.

Progress that motivates, not just informs

Email can't rely on hover or tap states, so nothing sits behind an interaction — earned miles, three tiers and their rewards, and the next action all show at once, in one small card.

Theming

Same modules, tons of theming options

The system I built has a structure flexible enough to stretch across a huge variety of promotional and campaign needs with just a simple image or color swap — theming at the base level, so seasonal work doesn't mean maintaining a separate template for every holiday. Colors and imagery live as tokens on the module, not hardcoded — so a campaign moment is a retheme, not a rebuild. Creative drops in a hero image and swaps one hex value; the module handles the rest. No dev ticket, no rebuild. Emails can be themed for black friday, holiday, or any theme creative wants with an easy switch. Every campaign moment used to require custom creative and a designer in the loop for every send; but now one image and a hex value switch with no designer involvement at all, creates an entirely custom experience.

Results

Results

I took the buttons off. Clicks went up.

The whole redesign shipped together, measured live against the existing template across two United campaigns and four send dates — 610,000 recipients, 27% of sends. Click-through, click-to-open, and shop rate all rose against the control, while deliverability, spam complaints, and unsubscribes held steady. It became the standard for rewards email across every client, and American asked when the site would be more like this.