03 · Business Consulting

An operator, not a slide deck.

Advanced business consulting for owner-led companies: pricing and margin, systems and process, supplier and fulfilment decisions, hiring and delegation, and the operational plumbing underneath all of it. Where an industry is regulated, the compliance work comes with it rather than as a separate vendor.

from $2,500Start a conversation

Who this is for: Owner-led businesses somewhere past the point where the founder can hold the whole operation in their head, and short of the revenue that justifies a full-time executive to take it over.

Ways to engage

Starting prices, published.

These are floors, not quotes — the real number comes out of a scoping call and lands in a written proposal. Nothing is charged from this site.

Business diagnostic

fixed, ~2 weeks

from $2,500

A structured read of the whole business: where the margin actually is by product and channel, which processes are load-bearing on a single person, what your systems cannot currently tell you, and which constraint is genuinely binding right now. Delivered as written findings with a prioritised plan you can act on with or without us. Credited against a retainer started within 60 days.

Best for: Owners who know something is wrong but keep getting conflicting answers about what, and want one honest read before committing to anything.

Fractional operating partner

monthly, ~1 day/week

from $3,800/mo

A senior operator embedded one day a week, owning the parts the founder should no longer be doing: pricing and margin discipline, inventory and purchasing policy, supplier and 3PL negotiation, systems selection and implementation, process documentation, and the hiring plan for the roles that come next. Three-month minimum, then month-to-month.

Best for: Businesses where the founder is still the operations department, and it has become the ceiling on everything else.

Systems & process build

fixed, 6–10 weeks

from $9,500

Getting the business off spreadsheets and out of one person’s head. Systems selected and implemented, data migrated, processes written down as procedures a team will actually follow, and reporting that answers the questions you currently work out by hand. Your team is trained to run it and owns it afterward.

Best for: Businesses whose growth is limited by how much manual coordination the owner can personally absorb.

Part 111 readiness assessment

fixed, ~3 weeks

from $4,500

Regulated-industry specialization — supplement and nutraceutical manufacturers. A written, risk-scored gap assessment against a 21 CFR Part 111 checklist covering records, specifications, supplier qualification, training, complaint handling and traceability, including a co-manufacturer document review and a prioritised remediation plan with effort estimates. Credited against a quality system build started within 60 days.

Best for: Brands who have never been inspected, or who just got an audit date and need an honest read on their exposure.

Quality system build

fixed, 8–10 weeks

from $14,500

A full Part 111 system stood up and populated: SOP set, master manufacturing and batch production record templates, raw-material and finished-goods specifications, supplier qualification with CoA review workflow, a training matrix with Part 11 records, complaint and CAPA process, and a mock inspection dry run with written findings. Your team is trained to run it and owns it afterward.

Best for: Manufacturers who need a genuinely inspectable quality system before a retailer, NSF or FDA audit.

Label & claims review

per item

from $650 per label

Supplement Facts panel and label compliance review against FDA labeling requirements, with written findings and suggested corrections. The campaign option reviews the claims you intend to advertise and produces the approved claim register the advertising work is then required to stay inside.

Best for: Brands launching or reformulating SKUs, and anyone whose ads keep getting rejected because nobody wrote down which claims are defensible.

What you actually get

The work itself.

Margin analysis by product, channel and customer — where the money is actually made, and where it quietly is not
Pricing review, with the discounting and bundle decisions that follow from it
Process documentation: the procedures currently living in one person’s head, written down and delegable
Org and hiring plan — which role to add next, and what it has to take off the founder
Systems selection and implementation, including migration off spreadsheets
Reporting build: the numbers you currently assemble by hand, produced automatically
Inventory policy build: reorder points, safety stock, lead-time model and a maintained PO calendar
3PL, supplier and manufacturer selection and negotiation — client-paid only, with no referral fees accepted from any vendor
Regulated industries: risk-scored 21 CFR Part 111 gap assessment against a written checklist
SOP set plus master manufacturing record and batch production record templates, deployed in software
Supplier qualification programme: approval criteria, CoA review workflow, re-audit calendar
Specification files for raw materials, in-process material and finished goods
Training matrix, assignment tracking and Part 11-compliant training records
Mock inspection dry run with a written findings list and a remediation plan
Annual mock recall drill: a full lot traceability exercise from raw material to shipped customer
Supplement Facts panel and label review, plus an approved claim register the ad work must stay inside

Boundaries

What this does not include.

Said up front so nobody discovers it on week three.

An ex-FDA signature: We are operators and system-builders, not former investigators — on a live 483 or warning letter we coordinate a specialist and pass their fee through at cost rather than sell you credibility we do not have.
Referral fees: We take none from any 3PL, manufacturer, supplier or software vendor we recommend, and will put that in writing.
Legal, tax or accounting advice: We will tell you when a question belongs with your attorney or CPA rather than answer it anyway.
Bookkeeping, payroll, or acting as your registered agent.
Interim staffing: A fractional partner is one senior operator one day a week, not a team you can task with execution work.

This is a small, owner-led practice, not a fifty-person agency. The book is capped at a handful of active service clients so each one gets a senior operator rather than a junior pod — intake opens as slots free up.

Worth a conversation?

Describe the situation and we will tell you whether this is the right engagement — including when it is not, or when the cheaper one would do.

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