Insights from the CFO seat
Practical finance guides for ecommerce operators, SaaS founders, and owners preparing to sell.
How Much Does a Fractional CFO Cost? (And What Drives It)
What fractional CFO engagements cost across the market, what drives the number, and how to weigh the value against a full-time hire.
Read the articleFractional CFO vs Controller vs Bookkeeper: Who Does What
Bookkeepers record, controllers close, CFOs decide. A plain guide to the three finance roles and which one your business needs right now.
Read the articleSell-Side Quality of Earnings: Find the Problems Before Buyers Do
A sell-side Quality of Earnings lets you find and fix problems before a buyer's team does. What a QoE examines, when to run it, and how it prevents re-trades.
Read the articleEBITDA Add-Backs: What Buyers Accept, What They Reject
Your multiple gets applied to normalized EBITDA — so the adjustments matter. Which add-backs buyers accept, which they reject, and how to document each one.
Read the articleHow to Prepare Your Business for Sale: The 12–24 Month Checklist
Preparation is the highest-ROI work an owner does before a sale. A CFO's six-step sequence for the 12–24 months before you go to market.
Read the articleSaaS Unit Economics: CAC, LTV, and the Payback Number Investors Trust
The unit economics diligence teams recalculate: fully-loaded CAC, LTV on gross margin by cohort, and payback benchmarks by go-to-market motion.
Read the articleThe SaaS Board Deck: Metrics That Survive Investor Scrutiny
A SaaS board deck that survives scrutiny follows a five-part narrative and reports the same metrics — ARR bridge, NRR, burn multiple, Rule of 40 — the same way every month.
Read the articleWhen Should a SaaS Company Hire a Fractional CFO?
The trigger to hire a SaaS fractional CFO is complexity, not revenue: board questions you can't answer, burn as a standing topic, a raise on the horizon.
Read the articleDemand Planning for DTC Brands: Inventory Is a Cash Flow Decision
Inventory is the biggest cash decision a product brand makes. How to plan demand at the SKU level, time POs, and tie purchasing to the 13-week cash forecast.
Read the articleRevenue Is Up, Profit Is Down: Diagnosing the DTC Margin Squeeze
Record month, empty bank account. A CFO's diagnostic for DTC brands whose revenue grows while profit and cash shrink — and the order to fix it in.
Read the articleMER vs ROAS: Why Your Ad Dashboard Is Lying About Profit
ROAS measures ad efficiency, not profit. Here's why MER and contribution margin after ad spend — not last week's ROAS screenshot — should set your budget.
Read the articleShopify Contribution Margin: The Metric Your Dashboard Doesn't Show
Your Shopify dashboard shows revenue and, at best, gross margin. Here's how to calculate contribution margin per order and per SKU — and run the brand on it.
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