The archive · Developer & Business Tools · Product decision · 2012–2013
ZURB gave away responsive email templates, then shipped the Ink email framework
After making its own email responsive, ZURB released five free HTML templates (310 HN points) and productized the demand as the Ink framework.
ZURB
What the business is
ZURB, a product design company founded in 1998, sells design consulting, design tools and training, and was already known to web developers for its open-source Foundation framework; free 'playground' releases feed its audience and leads.
How it started
By late 2012, with 'more and more people pulling out their phones to check their email,' ZURB had made all of its own email campaigns responsive. Clients and readers asked ZURB to do the same for them, so the studio packaged what it had learned into free templates, posted them on its playground, and submitted them to Hacker News as a Show HN on 2012-11-30.
What happened
The Show HN drew 310 points and 93 comments, and the debate exposed the hard edge of the bet: desktop Outlook did not support the responsive CSS the templates relied on, and commenters argued such techniques could only work well for iOS and some Android clients. ZURB kept going, and the templates page went on to announce Ink, a responsive email framework the company said works 'on any device & client. Even Outlook.'
How it ended up
The templates stayed up as free downloads and ZURB shipped Ink as its responsive email framework, linking it from the same playground page; the page was still live when the archive fetched it on 2026-09-05, and ZURB continued to run its consulting business around its open-source tooling.
Background
In late 2012 ZURB, a product design company founded in 1998 and already known for the open-source Foundation framework, made all of its own email campaigns responsive — more and more people were reading email on phones. The change drew requests: a lot of folks asked whether ZURB could do the same for them.
ZURB packaged the work into five free, downloadable HTML email templates (basic, hero, sidebar, sidebar-hero and newsletter) with separate CSS files and a documented workflow for inlining and sending them through Campaign Monitor, MailChimp or similar tools. It posted them to Hacker News as a Show HN on 2012-11-30, where the thread drew 310 points and 93 comments.
The discussion turned on the weak spot of responsive email in 2012: desktop Outlook did not render the responsive CSS, so commenters argued the templates would only work well for iOS and some Android clients. The page's own support matrix was candid about it — Outlook 2007, 2010 and 2013 were marked 'No.'
ZURB answered by building Ink, a responsive email framework the templates page described as letting teams 'quickly create responsive HTML emails that work on any device & client. Even Outlook.' The free templates stayed live as the entry point, and the page was still being served when the archive fetched it on 2026-09-05.
What has to be true
- ZURB had already seen phones take over email reading, so responsive was a real and growing problem worth solving publicly rather than a speculative bet.
- Releasing the templates free matched ZURB's playbook — Foundation had made the studio a name among developers, and free playground releases fed its consulting and training business.
- Clients were literally asking for the same fix, which made the giveaway demand-led; the templates converted an internal capability into a visible offer.
- Building Ink after the templates let ZURB move from one-off help to a framework others built on, turning email expertise into an open-source asset the way Foundation worked for CSS.
What can be applied
Give away a hard-won internal fix free to test demand, then productize what clients ask for next; an honest support matrix that names the broken client (Outlook) is what makes the fix credible.
Aftermath
As of 2026-09-05 ZURB's responsive-email-templates page was still live on the company site, still offering the five templates as free downloads and promoting Ink as the responsive email framework that works 'even Outlook.' ZURB itself continued to operate its design consulting and training business. This record covers the 2012 templates release and the Ink framework that followed from it; the company's later product moves are separate events.
Sources
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