Soda
Soda
About
Soda uses AI to turn your inbox’s promotions tab into an organized digital wallet for rewards, brand incentives, and community-driven commerce.
Duration
January through December, 2025
Role
Product, Branding, Strategy
Market
AI, Rewards, Social
The Inbox Problem
Ground zero for promotional chaos.
Modern consumer rewards flow almost entirely through the inbox, where consumers regularly exchange their email addresses for discounts, early access, loyalty points and exclusivity.
Over time, this has created a fragmented ecosystem of value which has been buried under hundreds of unread promotional messages. Communication starts to feel like spam, codes expire, invitations are missed, and points are forgotten.
100+
brands flooding your inbox with emails
Email was never designed to function as a commerce interface. The inbox prioritizes reading over acting, and the Promotions tab in particular has become a high-volume archive rather than an actionable system.
Identifying Market Fit
The Inbox Juxtaposition.
70%
Unopened promotional emails
Users have become overwhelmed with the amount of messages in their inbox and, as a result, underutilize the value that belongs to them.
E-commerce promotional emails see open rates around 30%, meaning roughly 70% go unopened.
>$100B
In loyalty & rewards
At the same time, estimates suggest hundreds of billions of dollars in loyalty and reward value sit unredeemed worldwide.
And as social commerce grows towards a projected multi‑trillion‑dollar market by 2030, there is still no standard infrastructure that connects inbox engagement with capturing this latent value.
Completing desk research revealed an opportunity for email communication to turn low engagement into meaningful economic impact.
Users have become overwhelmed with the amount of messages in their inbox and, as a result, underutilize the value that belongs to them.
E-commerce promotional emails see open rates around 30%, meaning roughly 70% go unopened.
At the same time, estimates suggest hundreds of billions of dollars in loyalty and reward value sit unredeemed worldwide.
And as social commerce grows towards a projected multi‑trillion‑dollar market by 2030, there is still no standard infrastructure that connects inbox engagement with capturing this latent value.
Creating Product Positioning
The AI Social Wallet
Apart from the core product definition of interface and interaction design, I was translating the idea of a chaotic inbox into a clear, investable thesis through growth strategy and product positioning.
Being able to clearly define the positioning of the product was crucial for our design strategy.
We did not want to be categorized into the niche of rewards or productivity apps, though those were clear principles of our value proposition.
We also found that AI could make the value of our inbox wallet more impactful—through smart tagging, alerts, and more. I validated this idea by running small unit tests across different email layouts and categorization groups.
We were asking users to recontextualize promotion emails, which they have become conditioned to ignore as spam, into a new kind of monetary or social value.
I had to make features like curation, organization, and filtration desirable for users not as a way of cleaning up their inbox, but as tools that promote engagement between brands and build stronger relationships with the products they love.
About
Soda uses AI to turn your inbox’s promotions tab into an organized digital wallet for rewards, brand incentives, and community-driven commerce.
Duration
January through December, 2025
Role
Product, Branding, Strategy
Market
AI, Rewards, Social
The Inbox Problem
Ground zero for promotional chaos.
Modern consumer rewards flow almost entirely through the inbox, where consumers regularly exchange their email addresses for discounts, early access, loyalty points and exclusivity.
Over time, this has created a fragmented ecosystem of value which has been buried under hundreds of unread promotional messages. Communication starts to feel like spam, codes expire, invitations are missed, and points are forgotten.
100+
brands flooding your inbox with emails
Email was never designed to function as a commerce interface. The inbox prioritizes reading over acting, and the Promotions tab in particular has become a high-volume archive rather than an actionable system.
Identifying Market Fit
The Inbox Juxtaposition.
70%
Unopened promotional emails
Users have become overwhelmed with the amount of messages in their inbox and, as a result, underutilize the value that belongs to them.
E-commerce promotional emails see open rates around 30%, meaning roughly 70% go unopened.
>$100B
In loyalty & rewards
At the same time, estimates suggest hundreds of billions of dollars in loyalty and reward value sit unredeemed worldwide.
And as social commerce grows towards a projected multi‑trillion‑dollar market by 2030, there is still no standard infrastructure that connects inbox engagement with capturing this latent value.
Completing desk research revealed an opportunity for email communication to turn low engagement into meaningful economic impact.
Users have become overwhelmed with the amount of messages in their inbox and, as a result, underutilize the value that belongs to them.
E-commerce promotional emails see open rates around 30%, meaning roughly 70% go unopened.
At the same time, estimates suggest hundreds of billions of dollars in loyalty and reward value sit unredeemed worldwide.
And as social commerce grows towards a projected multi‑trillion‑dollar market by 2030, there is still no standard infrastructure that connects inbox engagement with capturing this latent value.
Creating Product Positioning
The AI Social Wallet
Apart from the core product definition of interface and interaction design, I was translating the idea of a chaotic inbox into a clear, investable thesis through growth strategy and product positioning.
Being able to clearly define the positioning of the product was crucial for our design strategy.
We did not want to be categorized into the niche of rewards or productivity apps, though those were clear principles of our value proposition.
We also found that AI could make the value of our inbox wallet more impactful—through smart tagging, alerts, and more. I validated this idea by running small unit tests across different email layouts and categorization groups.
We were asking users to recontextualize promotion emails, which they have become conditioned to ignore as spam, into a new kind of monetary or social value.
I had to make features like curation, organization, and filtration desirable for users not as a way of cleaning up their inbox, but as tools that promote engagement between brands and build stronger relationships with the products they love.
Wallet organization visualizer for social media, made with Jitter.
Setting Design Guidelines
An infrastructure opportunity.
Leverage categorization & summary skills of AI.
AI-Forward
Search events
on Soda
Design interactions for saving, spending, and sharing.
Wallet Behavior
Save
Share
Apply
Make value visible and time-sensitivity clear at a glance.
Organization & Clarity
Active 20%
Wallet balance
$124.09
@suanbeii
Suan Bei
Earn trust from the user by providing clarity and control.
Inbox Permissions
Manage Senders
Select the senders whose messages you want to keep receiving in your Soda inbox.
Search contacts
All
People
Communities
Alpha Signal
noreply@alphasignal.com
Associated Press
apnews@associatedpress.com
Atmos
connect@atmos.earth.com
ByteByteGo
hi@bytebytego.com
California Arts
clientservices@california-arts.com
Complex
info@complex.com
Forbes Daily
daily@forbes.com
Going
support@going.com
Morning Brew
crew@morningbrew.com
MSCHF
support@mschf.com
Mubi
support@mubi.com
Paloma Wool
hola@palomawool.com
The New York Times
nytdirect@nytimes.com
Save Changes
Cancel
I reframed the inbox as a fragmented log of consumer value, containing receipts, discounts, invitations, and early-access offers.
However, I still recognized that this information was treated purely as communication rather than usable assets in the traditional inbox.
I defined a design direction to extract, organize, and activate these benefits, turning promotional emails into structured inputs for a wallet system instead of more messages that go easily forgotten.
The goal was to help users capture and use the full value of their relationships with brands.
Feature Prioritization
Profiles as the center of value.
Profiles as the center of value.
Again, email was created as a form of communication, a way to stay connected before Facetime or Instant Messaging existed.
Again, email was created as a form of communication, a way to stay connected before Facetime or Instant Messaging existed.
I recognized that while the function of the inbox had evolved, the experience had not.
I recognized that while the function of the inbox had evolved, the experience had not.
I wanted Soda be a bridge between brands, consumers, and community, not just a utility tool.
I wanted Soda be a bridge between brands, consumers, and community, not just a utility tool.
To enable this, I made a deliberate shift to prioritize the profile as the center of the experience rather than the inbox itself. The profile becomes a space where value is organized, brand relationships are surfaced, and interactions can happen more meaningfully—while keeping the inbox as the underlying content layer.
To enable this, I made a deliberate shift to prioritize the profile as the center of the experience rather than the inbox itself. The profile becomes a space where value is organized, brand relationships are surfaced, and interactions can happen more meaningfully—while keeping the inbox as the underlying content layer.
The inbox already functions as a fragmented log of consumer values, containing everything from purchase receipts, discount codes, product and event invitations, and early-access announcements.
However, this information is structured as purely communication, not as tangible assets.
We were not operating on the assumption that users wanted less promotional emails, but that they would rather have the value embedded within promotion messaging to be extracted, organized, and made actionable.
Instead of focusing on improving open rates or reducing clutter, we wanted to reinterpret promotions as several inputs into a wallet system.
Leverage categorization & summary skills of AI.
AI-Forward
Design interactions for saving, spending, and sharing.
Wallet Behavior
Make value visible and time-sensitivity clear at a glance.
Organization & Clarity
Earn trust from the user by providing clarity and control.
Inbox Permissions
Setting Design Guidelines
An infrastructure opportunity.
A comprehensive receipts that helps users track their spending—rewarding their brand loyalty.
Clearly displayed rewards and brands cash—for you and your people.
Discovery powered by AI.
Promotional email content in a more visual form factor that empowers engagement & organization.
Special Thanks
Rayhan Rumman
Baylee Feore
Tim MacGougan
Mono Studio
The Soda product has been temporarily archived. The team has pivoted to a new project, currently in progress. We hope to update you soon.