A Modern Alternative to Postcards for Email Design
When a modular builder stops feeling modern
Postcards — the email builder from Designmodo — has a clear identity. It’s modular: you assemble emails from pre-designed blocks, customize them, and export clean HTML. For designers and developers who like predictable, structured output and don’t mind hands-on assembly, it’s a tool with a genuine point of view.
What brings teams from Postcards to this comparison is usually a shift in how they work. They started happy with the modular approach, then found that modern expectations — several people editing at once, a faster path from idea to draft, one-click delivery to their sending tool — are exactly where a solo, assembly-focused builder doesn’t keep up. This is an honest look at where the two diverge, crediting Postcards for its strengths and being direct about where Temway pulls ahead.
What Postcards does well
Postcards has real merits, especially for a certain kind of builder:
- A clean, modular system. Pre-designed blocks that snap together predictably, which suits people who think in components and like structure.
- Developer-friendly output. The exported HTML is tidy and readable, which matters to teams that hand-edit or version-control their email markup.
- Attractive templates. The design quality of the starting points is genuinely high.
- Flexible pricing history. Postcards has offered options that appeal to people who prefer one-time payments or flexible terms over an ongoing subscription.
- A no-nonsense focus. It knows what it is — a block assembler — and doesn’t overload the interface with features outside that scope.
For a solo designer or a developer who wants clean output and modular control, Postcards is a reasonable choice.
Where teams tend to outgrow it
The friction shows up as the workflow becomes collaborative and recurring:
- More manual assembly. The modular approach means you’re doing more of the building yourself — there’s no AI to generate a first draft or restructure sections from a description.
- Limited live collaboration. Postcards isn’t built around several people editing together, reviewing, and approving in real time.
- Weaker live cross-client preview. Confirming exactly how an email renders in Outlook, Gmail, and Apple Mail can take extra steps or external tools.
- Fewer modern niceties. No AI authoring, lighter team and branding management, and an interface that some find less current than newer entrants.
- More steps to deliver. Getting the finished email into your sending tool isn’t always a single click.
Side-by-side comparison
| Postcards | Temway | |
|---|---|---|
| Building style | Modular block assembly | Drag-and-drop blocks plus AI authoring |
| Speed to a first draft | Manual assembly from modules | Fast from templates and from a plain-language prompt |
| Team collaboration | Single-user focused | Core to the product — workspaces, roles, live editing, comments |
| Cross-client rendering | Clean output; preview needs attention | Built to render correctly across Gmail, Outlook, and Apple Mail by default |
| AI authoring | Not available | Describe an email and get a structured, branded draft |
| Pricing model | Flexible / one-time options historically | Built for teams — see billing and plans |
| Export | Clean HTML export | HTML export |
| Push to your ESP | Export-then-import | One-click push — lands as an editable template |
| Audit log | Limited | First-class, for review or compliance needs |
When to stay with Postcards
Postcards is still the right call for some teams:
- You love modular, hands-on assembly and prefer building from structured components.
- You’re a developer or technical designer who values clean, readable exported HTML and likes to hand-edit.
- You’re a solo builder without a team-collaboration requirement.
- Flexible or one-time pricing suits you better than a team subscription.
If that describes you, there’s no reason to switch. The honest goal is matching the tool to how you actually work.
When Temway is the better fit
Temway tends to win when the work is collaborative, fast, and recurring:
- Several people build and review emails together. Workspaces, roles, edit locks, and comments and approval are built in from the start.
- You want AI to do the first draft. Describe the email in plain language and get a branded, structured starting point, then refine by conversation and finish by hand — see AI vs manual building.
- Rendering has to be reliable everywhere. Every email is built to render correctly across Gmail, Outlook, and Apple Mail without manual fixing.
- Delivery should be one click. Push your finished email straight to your ESP and it lands as an editable template — no export-and-import round trip.
- Branding should be automatic. Set your colors, fonts, and logo once in shared branding, and every new email starts on-brand.
Switching from Postcards
Switching is low-risk because Postcards’ output is portable HTML:
- Your designs aren’t locked in. Export the HTML from Postcards and import it as a starting point, or rebuild from a Temway template that matches your structure.
- Your sending setup is unchanged. Temway is a builder and exporter — your campaigns still send from your ESP. Push your finished email to your existing provider and it lands as an editable template, right where your lists and automation already live.
- Bring your branding once. Set it in shared branding so every new email starts consistent, instead of re-styling modules by hand each time.
Where to go next
- Read how export and ESP push work — including the one-click push that replaces export-and-import.
- See why combining AI with manual building is Temway’s core workflow.
- Browse the templates gallery, or compare another builder in Stripo vs Temway.