I created an account as if I were a customer so I recieved the newsletter as the admin and also to another email address as a customer....So I know the customers are not getting the email in html.....since this is a problem with no fix, I had to remove use of the newsletter and go thru each customer setting individually and find the ones subscribed to the newsletter to get their email addy. Now I send a newsletter using OE. But I had to set up a mailing list they can subscribe to on the front page of the store in place of a newsletter.