Fractional COO for businesses that move physical product.
Retail and DTC brands, distributors and logistics operators. When the operation is what your customer actually experiences, it needs someone senior who has run one at scale.
Book a 20-minute call Compare the cost
Three kinds of business, one common problem: the operation has outgrown the people running it.
Retail and DTC brands
Stock that doesn't match across three systems. A 3PL you've outgrown or never quite trusted. Returns eating margin, peak on the way, and the founder still the person who fixes everything. I've run fulfilment from the 3PL side for brands including ASOS, Sosandar and Step One, so I know where the gaps between brand and warehouse usually sit.
Distributors and logistics operators
Sites growing faster than the management around them. Margin going on overtime, agency labour and contracts priced before costs moved. This is the world I ran at GXO: large sites, big teams, tight service levels and a P&L that doesn't forgive.
Owner-managed and PE-backed businesses
The founder has become the bottleneck, or a value creation plan needs delivering on the floor rather than presenting at board. Also for sudden gaps: a departure or growth spike that can't wait twelve weeks for a search.
What an engagement actually covers.
- 3PL selection, contracts and service-level performance
- Stock accuracy, inventory planning and cash tied up in stock
- Peak planning: labour, capacity and carrier cover
- Returns: process, cost and what they're telling you
- Warehouse and systems change: WMS, ERP, new sites
- Labour planning, shift patterns and agency spend
- Cost to serve and margin by channel
- Board reporting you can actually run the operation from
What founders I've worked with say.
Rob brings a strong commercial mindset and a very practical, grounded approach to business. … it’s clear he has a solid understanding of both the financial and operational aspects of building and scaling businesses, particularly within a buy-and-build context. He asks the right questions, focuses on what matters, and adds clarity to discussions.
What sets him apart isn't advice, it's the questions and challenges. He takes the time to understand what's actually going on in a business before he says a word about what to do. … If you run a logistics business and you're feeling the pressure on margin or operational drag, Rob is the person you want in the room. He'll find what's actually broken and help you fix it.
Diagnostic. Plan. Delivery.
Diagnostic
Two to three days inside the operation: numbers, floor, team, customers. You get a written view of what's working, what's leaking and what to fix first. Useful even if we never work together again.
30-60-90 plan
Priorities, owners, cadence and governance agreed with you and the board. Days per month fixed in advance, typically two to eight, with costs agreed before we start.
Delivery and reporting
Embedded leadership on the agreed cadence: leading the team, unblocking decisions, holding the number, reporting to the board monthly. Exit criteria are defined from day one. The job is to make myself unnecessary.
A COO's grip. A fraction of the cost.
A fractional COO typically runs at a fraction of the fully loaded cost of the equivalent full-time hire, once you count salary, employer NI, pension, car, bonus, the recruitment fee and the notice-period risk.
The calculator does that comparison properly on your own numbers. Then we talk specifics.
Open the cost calculatorTwenty minutes to see if it fits.
Fit, scope and honest cost. If fractional support isn't the right answer for your business, I'll tell you.
Book a call