Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home — Enterprise E-commerce case study cover

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Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home

Enterprise E-commerce

Bringing A Seamless Pet Care e-Commerce Experience

Hill's to Home is Colgate Palmolive's number one vet recommended direct to consumer e-commerce platform for pet food, generating over 2 billion dollars in yearly sales. It connects veterinarians and pet parents through two portals, so clinics can manage wellness and prescription diets while pet parents order vet approved food online. It simplifies prescription tracking, supports auto delivery, and helps clinics keep clients through repeat orders.

key
responsibilities

Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home enterprise e-commerce product interface screen
Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home enterprise e-commerce product interface screen

Project overview

Colgate Palmolive's pet care division runs two main digital platforms: a Vet Portal for veterinarians to manage pet prescriptions, and a Pet Parent Portal for pet owners to order food and manage deliveries.

Both platforms had inconsistent design, complex workflows, and poor accessibility, leading to low clinic adoption, user frustration, and high support requests.

Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home redesign overview composition

My design philosophy is to build experiences that feel natural, are easy to access, and rooted in empathy.

Process

The design process combined creativity, technical skill, and close collaboration, with each stage carefully planned and executed to ensure high quality results.

Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home design process working session

Setting the scene with the production team

The process began with research to identify user behaviors and pain points across both portals. I then built user flows and wireframes to test navigation early, followed by detailed prototypes to refine visuals and accessibility.

Working with product managers, engineers, and QA ensured accuracy and consistency. Usability testing guided final tweaks before launch, creating a smooth experience for both veterinarians and pet owners.

Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home wireframes and information architecture exploration
Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home wireframes and information architecture exploration

User Flows

This user flow maps how customers move between Colgate Palmolive's digital properties when shopping for prescription and standard diets.

It highlights the current transition from Hill's Pet to Shop.hillspet and finally to the Hill's to Home checkout, showing how users navigate across multiple sites to complete a purchase.

Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home user flow and journey map diagram
Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home user flow and journey map diagram
Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home user flow and journey map diagram

Final Visual Design

  • Streamlined Prescription Management
  • Unified Design System
  • Improved Accessibility
  • Data-Driven Enhancements

Through focused design and close cross-team collaboration, the platform became unified, seamless, and trustworthy. The redesign brought the Vet and Pet Parent portals under one design system, simplifying prescription management and improving accessibility across devices. Clear navigation, modern UI, and data-driven updates increased clinician adoption and enhanced the ordering experience for pet owners, raising engagement by 12.5%, conversions by 5%, and reducing support requests.

Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home final design screens and dashboard
Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home final design screens and dashboard
Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home final design screens and dashboard
Colgate Palmolive / Hills to Home final design screens and dashboard

Achievements

The Hill's to Home redesign transformed Colgate Palmolive's pet care ecosystem. Collaboration between design, research, and engineering redefined the experience for both veterinarians and pet owners. Their shared focus on detail and user needs brought the platform to life.

— Product Design Team, Colgate-Palmolive Digital Experience

The updated Hills to Home portals showed clear gains in usability and engagement. Streamlined workflows and a unified visual system made prescription management easier and built more trust with vets and pet parents. Within the first year:

  • Vet approval time per order dropped 35%
  • Orders from Hillspet.com into Hills to Home increased 20%
  • Portal related customer support calls decreased 40%
  • The updated design system sped up releases and kept the UX consistent

Vet approval

Vet approval: 35%

Orders icreased

Orders icreased: 20%

Customer report

Customer report: 40%

“Working with Julieta over two years made it clear how dedicated and collaborative she is. She consistently brought positivity, insight, and design expertise to every meeting, elevating each stage of the redesign. Her thoughtful approach and professionalism made her an invaluable partner.” ⸺ CLIENT
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