Over the years as my email volume increased I did a lot of fine tuning to my email process (stars, labels, read/unread management, etc). Once it surpassed a certain threshold (maybe 250 per day), I just cut out email management entirely. I don't archive, I rarely label, I just go through the latest, respond to anything pressing, and if there's anything that needs further followup it goes to my OmniFocus inbox where I prioritize all my work.
Email is critical to my work, but gardening it is not worth the opportunity cost.
When I get an email I don't care about, I take action to make sure I don't get any more. I unsubscribe if it's a distribution list or some website that bought my email. I throw garbage I can't control into its own folder using Outlook rules. If it's a repo that I don't need, I unfollow it in github.