Corporate Institutional Website for an Industrial Group in Berlin: Governance and Cost (2026)

The verdict in three sentences

A corporate institutional site is not a bigger brochure site: it is an editorial governance system where press, ESG, careers and investor relations coexist under a validation workflow. In 2026, the real decision is not WordPress versus Sanity but who approves what, in which order, and how you hold WCAG 2.1 AA without slowing communications. Budget an order of magnitude of 25,000-45,000 EUR excl. VAT and 12-16 weeks for a clean, multilingual and governed foundation.

Governed headless CMS vs classic WordPress

The crux is governance: a press release is not published like a blog post. Across a holding plus subsidiaries you need a contributor → reviewer → comms director → publish circuit, with traceability. WordPress does this via plugins; a headless CMS like Sanity does it natively, with typed schemas and version history.

Headless costs more upfront but reduces the attack surface and secures compliance component by component, which matters for a media-exposed group.

Architecture: single multi-section site vs subsidiary multi-sites

Second structural decision: a holding steering 4 subsidiaries must choose between one corporate site with subsidiary sections, or a network of linked sites sharing a design system.

For a group that communicates first as a single brand, the single multi-section site offers the best value; multi-sites make sense when subsidiaries have genuinely distinct brands and audiences.

What a serious institutional foundation covers

A credible 2026 scope includes: a press room (releases, media kit, journalist contacts), an ESG section with indicators, a careers portal wired to an ATS, governance (board, executives), EU hosting compliant with GDPR, 99.9% uptime monitoring, and a delivered WCAG 2.1 AA audit. Monthly maintenance (400-800 EUR excl. VAT) covers security patches, CMS updates, backups and editorial support.

Mini case study

Marc, communications director of an industrial group in Berlin (holding + 4 subsidiaries), publishes roughly 30 press releases a year. Each release required 3 email round-trips and a publish by a vendor, averaging 4 days. With a Sanity workflow, the circuit drops to 1 day and bringing publishing in-house saves about 12,000 EUR excl. VAT/year of ad-hoc work. On an initial investment of 34,000 EUR excl. VAT for a single multi-section site, the time and press-responsiveness gains pay back the foundation in roughly 30 months, before counting the brand value of a compliant, fast site.

FAQ

Why does an institutional site cost more than a brochure site? Because you pay for governance, WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility, structured multilingual and security, not just design. A group foundation starts around 25,000 EUR excl. VAT versus 3,000-8,000 EUR for an SME brochure.

Is the validation workflow really essential? For an exposed group, yes: an unreviewed release can cost dearly in reputation. A traced contributor → reviewer → management circuit prevents risky publications and secures compliance.

How long to go live? Budget 12-16 weeks for a single multi-section site, 16-22 weeks for a subsidiary multi-site network with a shared design system.

Can we add a subsidiary later? Yes. On a single site, a subsidiary section costs 3,000-6,000 EUR excl. VAT; on multi-sites, a new site on the existing design system costs 9,000-15,000 EUR excl. VAT.

What maintenance budget should we plan? Between 400 and 800 EUR excl. VAT/month for a governed single site: security, CMS updates, backups, 99.9% monitoring and editorial support.

Let's scope your project. Tell us your structure (holding, number of subsidiaries, press/ESG/careers sections), your indicative budget and your go-live deadline. Detailed quote within 48 h. WhatsApp +221 77 596 93 33.