Where we look first
Recurring contracts with inconsistent prices, poor renewal visibility or fragmented buying across sites deserve early attention. We look at suppliers, volumes, service levels, payment terms, escalation clauses and the real cost of moving—or staying.
Typical categories worth assessing include facilities, logistics, outsourced services, packaging and repeat business consumables. We don't present every category as an area where we already have a specialist track record.
What makes a saving real?
A lower opening bid is not a saving. We agree a baseline, normalise scope and quantities, account for implementation costs and obtain your finance team's sign-off on the calculation. A contract only contributes to our success fee under the agreed verification rules.
Built for high-value engagements
Our focus is businesses with meaningful addressable expenditure, generally £5m or more per year. That allows a focused team to concentrate on negotiations that could materially change your cost base rather than pursuing dozens of minor purchases.
The difference between cutting costs and making the company weaker
A cheaper supplier is not automatically a better decision. Before recommending a lower-priced cleaning, logistics or outsourced support agreement, we examine minimum staffing, service levels, geographical cover, mobilisation costs and the operational consequences of supplier failure.
CFOs should ask how a claimed reduction will show up in monthly management accounts. Where finance cannot sign off the comparable baseline or operations cannot implement the arrangement, it should remain an opportunity rather than a verified saving.
A real-world decision to test
Example mandate: costs have risen across outsourced services, but there is no clear picture of which increases reflect more sites, higher usage or genuine price inflation. We separate those effects before asking suppliers to improve terms.
What you would receive
A defensible current-cost baseline, selected negotiations and a summary of implemented savings and one-off costs.
CFOs and Finance Directors leading margin improvement programmes.
The objective is a generic headcount-reduction programme rather than external supplier expenditure.
Questions worth asking
Will you recommend replacing suppliers?
Only if the business case is stronger after quality, disruption, risk and total cost are assessed. An incumbent renegotiation may be preferable.
What if the lower quote raises service or switching costs?
Then we should not treat it as a saving. We compare total first-year cost, transition charges, service levels and risk before recommending a supplier change.