# RedSeed’s first send on Brew opened at 60%, double the old average

Alice Mullins runs marketing at RedSeed. She left a messy Mailchimp setup, and the first sends on Brew opened at 57 to 70%.

Canonical: https://brew.new/customers/redseed

## At a glance

- Moved from: Mailchimp
- Industry: HR & leadership software
- Result: 60% open rate on the first send

> Our first email on Brew got a 60% open rate. Our old platform averaged 30%.
> Alice Mullins, Marketing Manager, RedSeed

## Before Brew

RedSeed makes software that helps managers coach their teams, and it is based in Christchurch, New Zealand. Until mid-2026 its email ran through Mailchimp: a couple of welcome journeys, bespoke updates to customers, and the odd promotion. **Opens on those sends sat around 30%,** which Alice had come to treat as normal.

The setup had got messy over the years. The connection between the website and Mailchimp was partly broken, so new leads had to be moved by hand, and **the lists had turned into what Alice calls a clunky mess.** With a rebrand and a new website on the way, and the Mailchimp contract up for renewal, it was the moment to leave.


## What changed

**Brew built RedSeed’s email design system from the brand’s Figma files,** and a colleague on the RedSeed side added the DNS records so mail.redseed.com was verified in an afternoon. Alice exported the Mailchimp list, cleaned it, and imported the 206 customer contacts first, with the wider marketing database following a week later.

The first real send was the rebrand announcement to existing customers in early August, followed by one to about a thousand marketing contacts the next day. **Alice built both herself in the Brew canvas, with the assistant drafting from the brand,** and then three account-manager emails, each sent from the manager to their own customer list.

Once the new website launched, the automations followed. **Website forms on the Kieran Read leadership page now trigger the welcome journeys that used to live in Mailchimp,** and a Communication Styles quiz splits people into four paths, Driver, Analytical, Relator and Expressive, so each gets the email written for their style.


## The results

**The first email on Brew opened at 60%, against a 30% average on Mailchimp.** The three account-manager sends that followed came in at 70%, 68% and 57%, which the accounts team was, in Alice’s words, stoked about.

RedSeed cancelled Mailchimp at the end of July and moved to a paid Brew plan after the first sends. **What Alice points to most is the experience rather than the numbers:** an assistant inside the tool that makes emails faster to make, and a team on the other end that helped with every step of the move.

## Read more

- [Read on LinkedIn](https://lnkd.in/p/eKArBauv)
- [RedSeed](https://www.redseed.com)
- [All customer stories](https://brew.new/customers.md)