Operational and financial advisory for the service trades

You're busy. The work is there.
So why does cash always feel tight?

I help service-trades owners figure out where the money is actually going — and what to fix first.

Usually the problem isn't the amount of work. It's that nobody can tell you what the work is actually making.

Call Isaac: 501-303-6105 Schedule a Call

30 minutes. No obligation. I'll tell you what I see.

HVAC · Plumbing · Electrical · Concrete · Roofing · Landscaping · General Contracting — Arkansas

Skilled trades contractor at work
The Problem

Does This Sound Familiar?

You're an expert at your craft. You stay busy. But something's not adding up.

01

Some jobs make money, others don't

You're not sure which — because you're not tracking profit per job or margin by service line.

02

Cash is tight despite consistent work

Staying busy but can't see more than a few weeks ahead on cash flow. Surprises keep coming.

03

Pricing feels like guesswork

No pricing model. No margin analyzer. Just gut feel and what competitors seem to charge.

04

You're always putting out fires

Reactive, not proactive. No dashboard to see problems before they become crises.

05

The business runs you

Owner-dependent. No systems. Falls apart when you're not there.

“None of this shows up as a line item on your P&L. That's what makes it expensive.”

The Diagnostic

Find Out What's Actually Wrong
Before You Spend Money Fixing It.

Most owners already have a theory. It's pricing. It's that one customer. It's the crew. Sometimes the theory is right.

More often the thing you can feel isn't the thing causing it. Cash gets tight because of collection timing, not margin. Margin slips because of labor overrun on one job type, not because your prices are low. You can work on the wrong one for a year and watch nothing change.

The diagnostic is how we find out which it is. I go through your actual numbers — your jobs, your pricing, your labor, your cash — and come back with what's happening in your business and what to do about it, in order.

What That Actually Takes

I don't run your numbers through a template. There isn't one that fits, and I don't know what fits until I see what you already have.

I ask for two things up front: twelve months of P&L and twelve months of job history. What happens next depends on what's in them. Some owners already have real job-level reporting and I build off what's there. Some have a checkbook and a stack of invoices and we start from scratch. Both are normal. They're not the same amount of work, and I'd rather know which one it is in week one than find out in week three.

The pricing model gets built from scratch almost every time, because it has to run on your labor rate, your material cost, and your overhead. There's no version of that I can hand you off a shelf.

Then I work backwards from what I find to what's causing it. A cash problem and a pricing problem look identical from the driver's seat. They don't get fixed the same way.

That's a week and a half of work before we ever get on the delivery call. Knowing what to look for in it took twenty years. That's why this isn't a phone call and a checklist.

What You'll Be Able to See

Six Questions You
Can't Answer Right Now.

Built from scratch around your business — your trade, your crew size, your service mix. No two are the same. These are the questions it answers:

Profit per job, by job typeWhich jobs actually made money?
Gross marginWhat am I keeping on each service line?
Cash runway, rolling 90 daysHow long can I cover payroll?
Labor efficiency, estimated vs. actualIs the crew running where I priced it?
Pricing accuracyHow close are my estimates?
AR agingHow much of my money is sitting in someone else's account?

Which of these we build depends on your trade and what's actually hurting. We scope it on the intake call.

How It Works
Day 1

Intake call — 60 minutes to understand your business, your trade, what's actually bothering you, and where you're trying to take it.

Days 2–9

Analysis — I go through your financials, your pricing, and your job history, and build what you need to see it.

Day 10

Delivery call — 90 minutes walking through every finding and what to do about it.

30 Days

Email support — Implementation questions answered. You're not on your own.

Ten business days from intake to delivery, and the clock starts when I have your P&L and your job history.

What Comes Out of It

Some owners take the plan and run it themselves. That's the point. Some want help executing it, and that's where we keep working together. Either way, what comes out of this is yours.

The Impact

What Changes When You
Can Actually See It

None of this is theory. Here’s what’s different in a business once the owner can see what’s actually happening.

None of this takes a bigger business. It takes seeing the one you’ve got.

01

You Stop Losing Money on Bad Jobs

Most trades businesses have work that looks busy and bleeds cash. Job costing tells you which service lines, job types, and customers are actually profitable — and which ones you’ve been subsidizing. You stop bidding the way you always have and start pricing for margin.

02

Cash Stops Being a Surprise

A rolling 90-day cash model shows you what’s coming before it gets here. Slow season, a big payable, a customer who’s always late — you see it weeks out and make a decision instead of a reaction.

03

Pricing Stops Being a Guess

A working pricing model runs on your actual labor cost, your materials, your overhead, and the margin you need. You stop wondering what to charge, and you stop dropping your number because a competitor came in low and you panicked.

04

The Business Runs Without You in the Middle of It

When the operations are written down and the numbers are tracked, you stop being the single point of failure. You can take a day, hand a job to a crew lead, or spend a week at the lake without it coming apart behind you.

05

You Decide From Numbers Instead of Stress

Should you hire another tech? Take the out-of-town job? Buy the equipment? When you know your numbers, the noise quiets down and the business tells you what it can actually carry.

The Bottom Line

Every one of those is the same thing said five ways. You stop reacting to the business and start running it.

How We Work Together

Everybody Starts
in the Same Place.

Every engagement starts with the diagnostic. It's how I find out what's actually going on, and it's how we both find out whether working together makes sense.

What happens after that depends on what we find. We'll figure it out on the call.

Start Here
01 — Entry Point

The Diagnostic

You find out what's actually happening in your business, and what to fix first.

One-time · about 10 business days
  • A KPI dashboard built for your trade
  • Pricing, job costing, margin, and cash flow tools built on your numbers
  • An 8 to 12 page memo — what's happening, what's causing it, what it's costing you
  • A 90-day plan in priority order
  • A 90-minute delivery call and 30 days of email support
Schedule a Call
02 — After the Diagnostic

Implementation Support

You've got the plan, and you want somebody in your corner while you run it.

Diagnostic in week one, then three months
  • Everything in the diagnostic, delivered in week one
  • I keep your dashboard current while you get used to reading it
  • Two 90-minute working calls a month
  • Priority email — answers in 24 to 48 hours
  • Every decision made against your actual numbers, not last year's gut feel
Schedule a Call
03 — Fractional COO

Hands On, Every Week

You don't need a full-time operations person. You need one a few hours a week, and then you don't.

Six-month minimum
  • Weekly eyes on your numbers, and a heads-up before something turns into a problem
  • Weekly working calls
  • Same-day access when something urgent comes up
  • On-site when it matters — job walks, reviewing bids
  • Systems built alongside you, so you can run them when I'm gone
Let's Talk

The six-month minimum isn't a subscription. It's how long the work takes to do properly. Every engagement has an end and a handoff.

What it costs depends on the size of the business and what we find. I'll give you a straight number on the call — no proposal process, no surprise.

Why I'm Different

The Job Isn't Done
Until You Don't Need Me.

Most advisors are built to stay. That's not a knock — it's how the model works. The longer you need them, the better their business does.

Mine works the other way. The diagnostic is ten business days and then it's yours — there's no next step you're required to buy. If you want me longer, the retainer buys capacity while the systems get built, someone in the business with you every week. Both have an end.

You get the pricing model, the job costing, the numbers you run the business by — and you get to run them without me.

If you still need me in year three, I did the job wrong.

What You Keep

01

You know which jobs make money

And which ones you've been subsidizing. Not a feeling. A number you can go check.

02

You price from your own costs

Your labor, your materials, your overhead, your margin. Not what the guy across town is charging.

03

You see cash before it gets tight

Ninety days out instead of two weeks. Enough room to make a decision instead of a reaction.

04

You can answer the question yourself next time

That's the part that matters. The systems stay. I don't have to.

You're not hiring me forever. You're hiring me until you've got control of it yourself.

Ongoing DependenceAdvice on Retainer

The relationship has no end. The value is in staying.

The systems live with the advisor. When he leaves, they leave.

You get told what to track.

Growth is the pitch no matter what shape the business is in.

Built for companies with a CFO and an operations manager.

A Defined HandoffSystems You Keep

Every engagement has an end date and a handoff.

The systems live in your business. When I leave, they stay.

You get shown how to read it, until you don't need me.

Stability first, then growth is a real conversation.

Built for the owner who is both.

“He was able to see my business from a completely different perspective than I had before. As a result, I now see my business as a whole and understand how all the different pieces work together, rather than viewing them as separate parts.”

Feedback shared with permission. Client and business withheld for confidentiality.

About
Isaac Fox — Fox Business Advisors

Isaac Fox

Operational Advisor

Fox Business Advisors, LLC
Arkansas

501-303-6105 isaac@foxbizadvisors.com foxbizadvisors.com

I'm Isaac Fox. I work with owner-operated service trades businesses that are doing real revenue but still feel harder to control than they should be.

Before this I spent about twenty years in corporate operations — finance, FP&A, sales operations, revenue operations, business intelligence. My job was building the numbers and systems large organizations run on: what to measure, what it actually means, and what to do about it.

Big companies paid a lot of money for that work. It isn't different work here. The business is smaller and the stakes are a lot more personal, which if anything makes it matter more.

I'm not going to pretend I can do your trade better than you. I can't. What I can do is figure out what your numbers are telling you — and I'm good at it.

Professional Background

BBA in Finance · MBA

Roughly 20 years in corporate operations — finance, FP&A, sales operations, revenue operations, business intelligence

Director and Senior Director level, leading operations inside large organizations

Built the KPI frameworks, forecasting models, and operating systems those companies run on

“Your CPA tells you what happened to your money. I help you control where it goes next.”

I don't do tax, bookkeeping, or audit work. If you've got a CPA, you keep them. I hand you back to them better organized than I found you.

Some owners want the business steady enough to take a week off. Some want to hand it to their kid someday. Some want it worth something when they're done. Once you can see the numbers, that's a real conversation — one year, three years, five. Wherever you're headed, we start in the same place.

What I'm after is simple. The supplier knows his numbers. The guy who hired you knows his. The bank knows theirs. Too often the owner is the only one at the table working off a feeling — and that's not a talent gap, it's an information gap. Close it and you stop taking the number you're handed and start setting it.

Beyond the Work

I grew up in Kirby, Arkansas — a small rural town in the southwest corner of the state — raised by a blue-collar family. Painters, construction workers, auto-body guys. I know how much the trades matter, not just as a business category, but to the families behind them and the communities they serve. I've also seen firsthand what an inconsistent business does to a household. That context doesn't leave you.

I'm not doing this to get back to a corporate paycheck. I had one. I'd rather spend my time on businesses like the ones I grew up around, and be home for the games.

Today I live in Benton with my wife and kids. My oldest plays baseball and keeps our calendar full. In the gaps we’re outdoors — the lake, hunting season, side-by-sides. I know the people I work with because I'm one of them.

Get Started

Stop Letting The Business Run You.

Ready to Run Your Business by the Numbers?

No obligation. No sales pressure. Just a 30-minute conversation about whether I can help with your specific situation.

Schedule Your Free Discovery Call 501-303-6105

Serving HVAC · Plumbing · Electrical · Concrete · Roofing · Landscaping · General Contracting in Arkansas

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