The Software House was chosen to create one online platform to rule all current and future marketplaces in Pet Media Group's ecosystem.

Pet Media Group acquired several independent pet marketplaces across Europe. Each marketplace ran on different technology stacks and had to be managed separately, creating massive operational inefficiencies. The company needed to transform these scattered platforms into one unified ecosystem while keeping every marketplace running without interruption.

Pet Media Group

Pet Media Group operates the world's largest network of online pet marketplaces. The company helps over 1.5 million pets find homes each year across Europe and is on a mission to redefine pet rehoming through technology, safety, and animal welfare standards. Founded to modernize Europe's fragmented pet marketplace landscape, PMG has secured over $12 million in investment and is positioning itself as the dominant player in the European market.

INDUSTRY

Marketplace

COUNTRY

United Kingdom (headquarters), operations across Europe

SERVICE PROVIDED

Platform unification, platform modernization

Challenge

After acquiring marketplaces like Pets4Homes (UK's largest pet platform with 7 million users), Hästnet (Sweden's horse marketplace), Annunci Animali (Italy), and PuppyPlaats (Netherlands), Pet Media Group faced a serious problem. Each platform operated independently with different codebases, technologies, and data structures. Managing them separately was killing efficiency and blocking the company's growth plans.

The existing setup meant that fixing a bug required fixing it separately on each platform. Adding a new feature? Do it four times. Analyzing business metrics across all markets? Nearly impossible. With plans to acquire more marketplaces, this approach wouldn't scale.

The core challenges included:

-> Fragmented infrastructure - Each marketplace ran on different technology stacks with separate codebases

-> Data silos - Hundreds of thousands of records spread across disconnected databases with different schemas

-> No shared features - Every new feature had to be built and deployed separately for each platform

-> Zero business continuity option - The marketplaces couldn't go offline during migration without losing revenue and user trust

-> SEO traffic risk – Any migration mistakes could destroy years of accumulated organic search rankings

-> User experience consistency – Each platform had different features, creating confusion for users and operational headaches

Solution

The Software House proposed building one unified platform with a shared codebase that could serve all current and future marketplaces while maintaining each market's unique characteristics. The solution centered on creating a flexible, multilingual system that would allow Pet Media Group to manage all brands from a single platform while preserving what made each marketplace successful in its local market.

The key was designing a custom data migration process that could move millions of records without any marketplace going offline. Rather than a big-bang migration that would risk everything, TSH designed an ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) process with a maintenance mode option. This allowed the team to pause new listings temporarily on the old platform, run the migration, and switch to the new system - all without affecting existing users or losing SEO rankings.

“The entire team from The Software House has invested an incredible amount of time to truly understand our business, our users and their needs - this is what ultimately has led to the fantastic results we have seen from working together.”

Eyass Shakrah

Co-Founder of PMG

Process

Team Composition

TSH assembled a cross-functional team that evolved based on project needs:

• 3 QA Engineers ensuring quality across all platforms

• 2 Product Designers creating consistent user experiences

• Several Node.js developers building the backend infrastructure

• 3 React Native developers creating the mobile app

• Frontend developers working on the web application

The team size and composition shifted flexibly throughout the partnership, scaling up for major initiatives like the data migration and adjusting based on specific technical challenges.

Technology Stack

• Node.js for the unified backend

• Custom ETL services for data migration

• AWS infrastructure (replacing legacy systems)

• DynamoDB for tracking migration state

• React for web applications

• React Native for mobile apps

  
  

Migration Strategy

The migration process followed a carefully planned ETL approach. Read the article below if you are interested in the details:

→ Data migration process enabled 4x revenue growth

Marketplace

Data Solutions

Maintaining Business Continuity

The team's top priority was ensuring zero downtime that could impact Pet Media Group's business. The migration happened in carefully planned phases:

1. Preparation: Built the new unified platform alongside existing systems

2. Testing: Ran extensive end-to-end test suites to catch issues before they hit production

3. Migration: Executed data transfers during low-traffic periods with the old platform in maintenance mode

4. Verification: Confirmed data integrity and SEO preservation before switching traffic

5. Cutover: Redirected users to the new platform with all their accounts and data intact

Each marketplace was migrated individually, reducing risk and allowing the team to refine the process before moving to the next platform. Users could still access their accounts, sellers kept their listings, and most importantly - 95% of organic traffic was retained throughout the entire migration.

One of PMG platforms

Technical highlights

Configuration System: Created a shared configuration module that handles regional differences - currencies, categories, regulations, languages—without duplicating code. This means fixing a bug once fixes it everywhere, and launching a new feature happens across all markets simultaneously.

SEO Preservation: Implemented careful URL mapping and redirect strategies to maintain search engine rankings. The team ensured that years of accumulated SEO value transferred seamlessly to the new platform.

Read more ->

Outcome

Thanks to the unified platform Pet Media Group can now rapidly onboard new acquisitions and scale across Europe without technical limitations.

Key Business Outcome