Overview
PHOENIX group used Siteimprove to strengthen digital accessibility across its European ecommerce presence, helping teams create more inclusive, trustworthy, and customer-centric digital experiences.
The Problem
As the European leader in pharmaceutical wholesale, pharmacy retail, and services for the pharmaceutical industry, PHOENIX group is guided by its mission: "We deliver health." Digital accessibility supports this mission by helping ensure that online healthcare services can be used reliably by as many customers as possible.
With local ecommerce sites across Europe serving customers in multiple countries and languages, the company’s digital presence is a critical touchpoint for people who depend on accessible, inclusive experiences — including those managing chronic conditions, older adults navigating healthcare options, and individuals with disabilities seeking support.
By the end of 2024, it was clear that accessibility needed to become a stronger priority with cross-country coordination. Local teams operated with different levels of expertise and maturity, creating opportunities to strengthen content quality, user experience, technical implementation, and brand consistency.
Across more than 350,000 web pages, opportunities existed spanning content quality, UX, code-level improvements, and brand alignment.
With the European Accessibility Act coming into effect in 2025, and markets like Norway already operating under long-established national accessibility law, the urgency was real. Without a unified approach, delivering consistently accessible digital experiences at scale would remain out of reach. The challenge was significant, but so was the commitment.
“Accessibility is not a 'nice to have.' It's part of being a trustworthy, customer-centric partner in people's health journeys.”
The Solve
PHOENIX group set out to strengthen accessibility across its European digital ecosystem and create a more consistent standard for inclusive customer experiences.
The goal: get 80% of its websites to a Siteimprove accessibility score of 90% or better for both WCAG A and AA compliance by the end of 2025.
Over the following months, PHOENIX approached accessibility not as a one-off remediation project, but as a cultural shift. Siteimprove supported this journey by giving teams a shared way to identify accessibility issues, track progress, and focus efforts where they would have the greatest customer impact. Workshops, knowledge sharing, and cross-functional collaboration helped bring ecommerce leads, content editors, designers, and developers into the same conversation.
As teams gained clearer visibility into accessibility topics and practical improvement areas, accessibility became easier to prioritize in day-to-day digital work. Shared best practices, local ownership, and a stronger common understanding helped turn accessibility from a compliance requirement into a responsibility teams could actively shape. A monthly accessibility leaderboard kept energy high across markets, and as teams learned to prioritize the actions with the greatest impact, something shifted. The results came quickly, and with them, a genuine sense of accomplishment that turned accessibility from an obligation into something people owned.
Best practices were also reflected more strongly in digital brand and content guidance, helping teams apply accessibility principles more consistently across multi-country brands such as BENU.
The initiative delivered strong progress and helped establish a more consistent accessibility foundation across PHOENIX group’s European digital presence. More importantly, it created awareness, momentum, and shared ownership for inclusive digital experiences.
The goal was met, and then some. By the close of the program, more than 90% of PHOENIX sites had reached the 90% threshold for WCAG A compliance, and more than 80% had reached it for WCAG AA.
For the millions of customers on the other side of those experiences, that foundation is felt in every interaction that works the way it should.
