Cost reduction and profit improvement
Costs drift. Software seats nobody uses, supplier prices that rose while nobody compared them, overtime that became routine, a lease renewed without negotiation, an insurance policy nobody re-quoted, and a payroll that grew faster than the work. Profit improvement is a disciplined review of every cost line against what it should be, followed by the fixes that stick. It is not an across-the-board cut. It is a line-by-line decision, with the numbers to back each one.
What you leave with
A costed list of improvements, the ones worth doing implemented, and a profit line that moved for reasons you can explain.
Who it is for
- Owners whose revenue grew and whose profit did not
- Companies facing a margin squeeze from wages, materials or rent
- Businesses preparing for sale that need a credible profit history
What we deliver
- A cost review of every account over the last 24 months, with benchmarks drawn from your own history and from how the business operates
- A costed improvement list, ranked by value and by how hard each item is to do
- Supplier renegotiations and re-quotes on the largest lines, run with you
- Labour analysis: productivity, overtime, scheduling and the real cost of each role
- A spend approval process so the savings hold
- A monthly cost tracker inside your reporting
How it runs
01Review
We read every expense line and every vendor for two years and flag what has grown, what is duplicated and what nobody owns.
02Rank
We put a value and an effort on each item and agree with you which ones to pursue.
03Execute
We renegotiate, cancel, consolidate and reschedule, and we document each change.
04Hold
We put approval limits and a monthly tracker in place so the savings do not drift back.
Engagement and fees
A 90-Day Sprint at $80K to $250K for a full review and execution across labour, suppliers and overhead. A Workshop of two to four weeks at $30K to $80K for the review and the ranked list where you will execute yourself. Every engagement is scoped after a call and confirmed in writing. See consultations and fees.
Where the money usually is
In most companies your size, the opportunity sits in four places. Labour, which is the largest cost and the least measured, where overtime, idle time and roles that no longer fit the work add up. Suppliers, where prices rose with inflation and were never challenged. Overhead subscriptions, insurance and leases, which renew on autopilot. And process, where the same work is done twice because two systems do not talk.
The amounts are rarely dramatic on any one line. They are significant in total, and they compound, because a cost you remove this year is removed every year after. The review is tedious and specific. That is why it works and why owners seldom do it themselves.
Cutting without damage
An across-the-board percentage cut punishes the good spending with the bad. It takes the marketing that produces leads along with the subscription nobody opened. We rank each item by what it returns, and we protect the spending that drives revenue. Some lines should go up.
Labour is handled with care. The goal is productivity and fit, not headcount for its own sake. Often the fix is scheduling, a clearer role or a tool that removes rework, and the payroll stays while the output rises. Where a role genuinely no longer fits, we plan it properly with your HR adviser and your lawyer.
Making it stick
Savings erode because the habits that created the cost are still there. The last part of the work is a spend approval process with limits by role, a vendor list with owners, and a monthly line in the management pack that tracks the improvements against the baseline.
For an owner preparing to sell, this work has a second payoff. Buyers price a company on its profit, and a documented profit improvement with a clean trail shows a buyer that the result is real and repeatable rather than a one-time adjustment. BizSell.ca, Ali's brokerage, handles the sale side when that time comes.
- General ledger detail for the last 24 months
- Vendor list, contracts and renewal dates
- Payroll by role, with schedules and overtime
Industries where we run this most
Questions about this service
How much can we expect to save?
We do not quote a number before the review, because the honest answer depends on your cost structure and how long it has been since anyone looked. The review in the first weeks produces a ranked list with a value on each item, and that list is the estimate.
Will this mean layoffs?
Not as a starting point. Labour is reviewed for productivity, scheduling and fit before headcount. Where a role no longer matches the work, we plan the change properly with your advisers. Many engagements end with the same team producing more.
Do you negotiate with our suppliers directly?
We prepare the comparison, the volumes and the ask, and we join the conversation with you or run it on your behalf where you prefer. Suppliers respond to data, and most have not been asked for a better price in years.
How is this different from a fractional CFO?
This is a defined project with a start and an end. A fractional CFO is an ongoing seat that includes cost discipline as one of its duties. Many clients run this project first and keep the seat afterwards to hold the gains.
Start with a finance review.
Ninety minutes with Ali on your cash, margin and pricing. You leave with the four numbers to watch and the two or three moves that change them, whether or not we work together.