A Fractional COO engagement with OpsX is built differently. Patrick works directly inside your business — implementing solutions, restructuring operations, and building the commercial disciplines your team needs to hold the ground after he's gone. No decks. No recommendations without execution. No theory.
Most operational consultants deliver a diagnosis and a set of recommendations. They leave. Nothing changes. The founder still has the same freight problem, the same inventory exposure, the same system that was never built to scale.
A Fractional COO engagement is fundamentally different. Patrick works inside your business at the level of a part-time executive — present for the decisions that matter, implementing the changes directly, and building the disciplines that outlast the engagement.
Full audit and renegotiation of carrier relationships, 3PL contracts, dimensional weight strategies, and packaging efficiency. Typically delivers 18–30% cost reduction.
Replenishment model rebuild, safety stock rationalisation, demand planning frameworks. Frees significant working capital without compromising service levels.
End-to-end scoping, vendor selection, implementation oversight and go-live. Delivered without the risk of a botched rollout derailing the business.
COGS analysis, supplier renegotiation, landed cost mapping, SKU rationalisation. Systematic identification and removal of margin leakage across the P&L.
Decision frameworks, accountability structures, and operating rhythms that reduce founder dependency and give the team a clear standard to operate against.
I spent twenty years watching exceptional brands operate with one hand tied behind their back — not because their people lacked ambition, but because no one had ever given them a proper operational foundation. That's what OpsX is built to fix.
After two decades building and scaling operations inside some of the world's most commercially demanding retail businesses, Patrick founded OpsX to bring that same standard of operational thinking to ambitious e-commerce and retail brands who couldn't otherwise access it.
The partnership with Firestarter ensures that operational improvement is always connected to growth — two disciplines that are too often treated as separate when they are, in practice, inseparable.
No two engagements are identical. The structure below represents the typical flow — but every engagement is scoped to the specific problems and opportunities inside your business.
You submit an enquiry with a brief on your business and the problems you're facing. If there's clear potential, we schedule a no-commitment discovery conversation — typically 45 minutes.
Patrick reviews your P&L and key operational data. We identify the specific leverage points and present a clear, honest view of what can be improved and what that improvement is worth commercially.
We scope the engagement to the problem — scope, cadence, time commitment, and commercial terms. No fixed packages. No minimum term imposed. The structure serves the outcome.
Patrick works alongside your team to implement changes, build new disciplines, and transfer the operational capability needed to hold the ground without ongoing reliance on external support.
No minimum term. Structured entirely around what the engagement requires — not a fixed package.
Scoped against the specific problem and commercial opportunity. Enquire to start the conversation.
Retail or e-commerce brands with physical inventory, real operational complexity, and genuine growth ambition.
The following represent anonymised outcomes from Fractional COO engagements. Details have been changed to protect confidentiality — the commercial results have not.
A full carrier mix audit and renegotiation delivered a 26% reduction in freight costs within the first 90 days — freeing over $340,000 annually without any change to service levels or delivery windows.
A replenishment model rebuild and safety stock rationalisation unlocked $1.1M in working capital that had been trapped in slow-moving and overstocked SKUs — with no increase in stockout incidents.
A broken legacy system replaced with a fit-for-purpose ERP in under five months. Full scoping, vendor selection, migration, and go-live managed end-to-end. Zero disruption to fulfilment during transition.
Across carrier mix, rate renegotiation, and packaging.
Through replenishment and safety stock rationalisation.
Landed cost, SKU mix, and fulfilment restructuring.
Governance, ownership, and capability installed.
A Fractional COO engagement isn't for every brand. It's suited to businesses with a specific, structural operational problem that requires hands-on leadership to solve — not just advice.
Patrick brought a level of operational clarity and discipline we simply didn't have before. Freight, inventory, and growth planning all became controlled instead of reactive. The impact was immediate and lasting.
In our world, capital only works when the underlying operations are sound. Patrick's operational judgment materially improves outcomes. We now insist he's involved where possible — it significantly increases the likelihood of success for the brands we support.
Working with Patrick fundamentally changed how we run the business. The shift wasn't incremental — it was structural. Freight, inventory, and decision-making all moved from reactive to controlled.
No commitment. No pitch. Just an honest conversation about whether a Fractional COO engagement is the right fit — and if it is, what that could realistically mean for your business.
We review every enquiry personally. If we believe there's a clear path to a meaningful commercial outcome, we'll be in touch within 2 business days to schedule a call.
We review every enquiry personally. If there's a clear fit, you'll hear from us within 2 business days to schedule a discovery call.