New member email setup

How Sponic email works

Sponic Gardens doesn’t run its own mail server. Two services work together so you can send and receive @sponicgardens.com mail from your existing personal Gmail:

The result: one Gmail inbox for everything. No extra apps, no separate login.

What you need before starting

• Claude Code open in the sponic monorepo (the codebase at github.com/sponicgarden/sponic).
• Bitwarden access to the DevOps-sponicgarden collection (ALPU.CA org). Claude Code uses infra/bin/bw-sponic to pull Cloudflare API tokens automatically — you just need your BW vault to be unlockable on this machine.
• Your personal Gmail address — this is where forwarded mail will land.
• The Sponic address you want — typically [email protected].

1 Paste the setup prompt into Claude Code

Copy the prompt below, replace the three placeholder values with your real info, and paste it into Claude Code. Claude will register your email address in Cloudflare and then pause for you to verify.

Set up a new @sponicgardens.com email address for me. I have the sponic
repo open and BW access on this machine.

My details:
- Sponic address I want: [email protected]
- My personal Gmail: [email protected]
- Display name: FULL NAME

Do the following in order:

1. Unlock BW via infra/bin/bw-sponic and get the Cloudflare Email Routing
   token for sponicgardens.com (check infra/runbook.md for the BW item
   name and the zone/account IDs).

2. Check if my personal Gmail is already a verified destination on the
   wingsiebird CF account. If not, register it:
   POST /accounts/{acct}/email/routing/addresses
   Body: {"email": "[email protected]"}

3. STOP and tell me to check my personal Gmail for the Cloudflare
   verification email (from [email protected]). I need to click the
   link before you can continue. Wait for me to confirm.

4. After I confirm: create the routing rule on the sponicgardens.com zone:
   POST /zones/{zone}/email/routing/rules
   Body: {
     "name": "[email protected] → [email protected]",
     "matchers": [{"type":"literal","field":"to","value":"[email protected]"}],
     "actions":  [{"type":"forward","value":["[email protected]"]}],
     "enabled": true, "priority": 10
   }

5. Update infra/runbook.md — add the new rule to the sponicgardens.com
   routing table and add my Gmail to the verified-destinations list.

6. Tell me the Cloudflare side is done and I should continue with Step 4
   in the email setup guide at:
   https://in.sponicgardens.com/indocs/sop/email-setup.html

2 Click the Cloudflare verification email

After Claude registers your Gmail as a destination, Cloudflare sends a verification email directly to your personal Gmail.

1. Open your personal Gmail.
2. Search for from:[email protected] "email routing".
3. Open it and click the verification link. You’ll see a Cloudflare page that says “Email address verified.”

3 Tell Claude you clicked it

Go back to your Claude Code session and say something like “I clicked the verification link, go ahead.” Claude will create the routing rule and update the runbook. Once it confirms success, your inbound email is live — mail sent to your @sponicgardens.com address will start arriving in your personal Gmail immediately.

4 Configure “Send mail as” in Gmail

Inbound is handled. Now set up outbound so you can compose and reply from your @sponicgardens.com address inside Gmail.

5 Confirm the Gmail verification code

After clicking “Add Account”, Gmail sends a verification email to your @sponicgardens.com address. Because Cloudflare is already forwarding that address to your personal Gmail, the code lands right in the same inbox — usually within 30 seconds.

1. Look for an email from [email protected] with subject “Gmail Confirmation.”
2. Either click the confirmation link or copy the numeric code into the still-open Gmail popup.
3. The popup closes. Your new address now appears under “Send mail as.”

6 Set defaults and send a test

Once the test passes: you’re done. Start using your @sponicgardens.com address for all Sponic correspondence.

Already set up with Resend SMTP?

If you previously configured “Send mail as” using Resend (smtp.resend.com), you should switch to Brevo. Resend’s idempotency handling conflicts with Gmail’s retry behavior, causing intermittent 550 errors.

1. Gmail → Settings → Accounts and Import.
2. Find your @sponicgardens.com address under “Send mail as.”
3. Click “edit info” → Next Step.
4. Replace the SMTP fields with the Brevo credentials from Step 4c above.
5. Click Save Changes.
6. Send yourself a test to confirm.

Troubleshooting

Need help?

• Slack — post in #tech-support.
• Email — reach out to [email protected] from your personal Gmail.
• Deep-dive docs — Email system architecture has the full technical picture (DNS records, Cloudflare rules, Brevo/Resend setup).

Last updated 2026-05-28. Infra: Cloudflare Email Routing (wingsiebird account), Brevo SMTP ([email protected]), BW collection DevOps-sponicgarden.