Product design case study · Design systems & multibrand platform

Tomodachi

One for all and all for one

One multibrand design system for three Swiss real-estate portals, consolidating ImmoScout24, Homegate and Flatfox onto a single platform without losing revenue.

Role Staff Product Designer · design-system & multibrand platform lead
Scope Uniting the biggest Real Estate portals into one System
Mandate Merge three competing portals onto one platform, preserve each brand, lose no revenue
SMG Tomodachi multibrand platform illustration

Consolidation challenge

Three separate portal stacks had to become one scalable product system.

3 design languages to consolidate
3 frontend codebases to align
0 shared components at the starting point
1 multibrand platform direction

How we did it

I led the design team across the consolidation, partnering closely with frontend, backend and product. My work covered multibrand design-system architecture, brand consolidation strategy, atomic component-library direction and incremental migration design.

SMG stakeholder map

Stakeholder map for the consolidation

01

The merger

02

Team restructuring

03

Product strategy

04

Design system alignment

05

Gradual launch

06

Project harmonization complete

Three Portals Meant Three of Everything

SMG ran three competing real-estate portals, each with its own design language, component set and codebase. That meant triplicated maintenance, inconsistent UX, slow shipping, and every future acquisition starting from zero.

3 design languages

Three separate visual systems to keep in sync.

3 frontend codebases

Every fix and feature built three times over.

0 shared components

Nothing reusable across the portals.

Auditing What Each Brand Actually Brought

Before consolidating, I audited each brand on three axes: brand equity, technical health and audience. Those inputs decided which brand would lead and which platform would host.

Brand equity. Just rebranded, with the freshest and most coherent identity of the three. Strong brand, but not the cleanest codebase.

Technical equity. Least technical debt, healthiest frontend and backend. Older brand identity, but the soundest foundation to build on.

Audience equity. A loyal niche audience and modern feel, but the smallest footprint: a brand to preserve, not to build the platform around.

Two Decisions, Deliberately Decoupled

The brand users see and the platform we build on are different problems. Treating them as one is how consolidations stall, so I solved them separately.

Lead brand

Freshest identity to standardise around

ImmoScout24 had the most coherent identity after its rebrand, making it the cheapest brand language to scale across the ecosystem.

Tradeoff I had run that rebrand, so I flagged my own bias and had the call pressure-tested by others.
Host platform

Healthiest codebase to migrate onto

Homegate had the least technical debt and the strongest technical foundation, making it the safest platform choice.

Tradeoff The strongest brand was not the strongest platform, so we stayed disciplined about separating those decisions.

Brand as a Theme Layer, Not a Fork

Instead of maintaining three design systems, I built one: shared atomic components, with each brand expressed as a set of design tokens for colour, type, spacing and iconography. The marginal cost of the next brand drops toward the cost of a new token set. We called it Tomodachi.

Shared Components

Tomodachi Whitelabel Component Library

Structure, behavior, accessibility and layout are built once.

ImmoScout24

Same components, ImmoScout24 tokens

Homegate

Same components, Homegate tokens

Flatfox

Same components, Flatfox tokens

Tokens over forks

Atomic source of truth

Acquisition-ready

One Component, Three Brands

Because brand identity lives entirely in tokens, a single component renders as any brand by swapping its token set. Same structure, same logic, same accessibility: only the skin changes.

Single shared component

One shared component

Three brand renderings

Three branded outputs

Outcomes

Revenue Goals Take rate increased by 48%

By offering our customers an easy way to crosslist and increase their visibility.

Product Design velocity up by 70%

Because of Whitelabel solution, designers can work on 1 platform delivering for 3 brands.

Maintenance Costs reduced by 66%

Teams got restructured and responsabilities shifted.

Easy integration for new adquisitions

New product adquisitions can be easily integrated and scaled.