Pricing

Fixed price. Fixed timeline. No hourly billing.

You should know what this costs before you get on a call with anyone. Here are the three stages, what each one includes, and what each one costs.

Read the Case Study

Most BI consultants quote you an hourly rate and an estimate, then send a change order when the data turns out to be messier than the estimate assumed. It always is. We price the other way around: measure the data first, then commit to a number and a date. The measuring is a real deliverable you pay for, and it comes off the build if you go ahead.

The Engagement Ladder

Three stages. Each one earns the next.

You are never committing to the whole thing at once. Each stage is priced on its own and produces something you keep, whether or not you continue.

Stage 1

The Assessment

$5,000

fixed · 2 weeks

Two weeks to the thing you are missing: one number both departments sign, or a count that matches the system, or an honest answer on whether your data can carry an AI. Three doors below, same price, same two weeks.

One reconciled number (or one readiness score) that Finance and Operations both sign
Every source traced, field by field, so the number holds up in the room
The two or three process changes that would move it, with a named owner on each
A written report you keep, and a fixed price for the build if one is warranted

Credited in full against a Foundation Build signed within 90 days. If the findings do not support a build, we say so and you keep the report.

Stage 2

Foundation Build

$35,000 - $55,000

fixed · 30 to 45 days

The governed data layer and the standard dashboard set, built on the definitions your departments agreed to in the assessment. A fixed menu, not a blank canvas.

A governed Power BI data layer with one source of truth per metric
The standard dashboard set: financial, operations, and labor
Every field described in plain English, so your people and your AI assistants read the same definition
The process fixes the assessment pointed at, designed with their owners: reason codes, cycle counting, purchasing discipline, ERP use
Data classification, workspace structure, and security groups
Named owners and a review cadence for every metric
A documentation and handoff packet your IT team keeps and maintains

Priced from your assessment findings, not from a guess. That is why the assessment comes first, and why we keep the right to reprice or decline a build when the assessment turns up a swamp.

Stage 3

Managed Intelligence

$3,500

per month · ongoing

Somebody has to own the numbers after launch. This is the part most BI projects skip, and it is why most BI projects quietly stop being used in year two.

Data quality monitoring with alerts before leadership sees a bad number
Model, report, and refresh maintenance
A monthly Plan-Do-Check-Act review with your metric owners: what moved, why, and what changes next month
A defined change envelope, written down, so nobody argues about scope

$42,000 a year, all in. No recruiting, no benefits, no payroll taxes, and no six-month ramp while a new hire learns your ERP.

A precision caliper closing on a machined block, representing pricing a build from measured findings rather than an estimate

Why The Assessment Comes First

We measure the data, then commit to a number.

Anyone can quote a build before looking at your data. The quote is a guess, and the change order arrives later. Two weeks of interviews and source tracing is what lets us put a fixed number and a fixed date in writing, and it is why we keep the right to tell you not to build at all.

Three Ways In

Same assessment. Pick the number you argue about most.

These are three of the numbers manufacturers argue about most. If yours is a different one, the assessment works the same way: two weeks, $5,000, credited in full against a build, and one number both departments sign at the end. What changes between doors is what we score hardest and what the fix list leads with.

Every month the numbers start an argument

Loss & Waste Analysis

Finance books shrink as a P&L variance. Operations counts waste in units. The board pack is late because the two have to be argued into one, and nobody owns the fix.

One loss-and-waste number Finance and Operations both sign
Broken out by cause, controllable separated from non-controllable
A named owner on every line
The process changes that would move it (reason codes, cycle counts, purchasing), scoped for the build

The count never matches the system

Inventory Accuracy Assessment

Shrink shows up at year-end and nobody saw it coming. Adjustments go in as free-text notes. The freezer holds product the system says is not there.

Adjustment-code audit, with the standardized reason-code set you should be using
Count variance by cause and by location
An A/B/C/D cycle-count plan sized to your SKUs
What your ERP is already configured to do that nobody uses

The board asked about AI

AI Readiness Assessment

Someone wants to connect Copilot or an AI assistant to your data, and you need to know if the data can carry it.

Readiness scored on the four things an AI depends on: agreed definitions, one source per metric, documented fields, governed access
Share of your model that is actually documented, field by field
The metrics an assistant would get wrong today, and why
What to fix first, before any AI project is funded

Findings report and prioritized fix list delivered in 10 business days from the day we have access, whichever door you come through.

How We Price

The rules we hold ourselves to

Three rules that show up in writing in every proposal we send.

No hourly rate. Anywhere.

You are not buying time, you are buying an outcome. An hourly rate rewards us for being slow and punishes you for asking questions. No proposal we send has an hourly rate on it.

Payment rides on delivery.

40% on signature, 40% when you sign off on the design, 20% when the numbers reconcile. That last 20% is the point. It makes the reconciliation promise collateral instead of a claim.

You get an answer to "what if you disappear."

Every proposal states the documentation standard, the handoff packet, and who maintains the system without us. In writing, before you sign, not after you ask.

Payment

You hold 20% until the numbers reconcile

40%

On signature

Work starts. Access requests go to your IT team the same week.

40%

At design sign-off

You have seen and approved the metric definitions, the data model, and the dashboard specs before anything gets built on top of them.

20%

At reconciled delivery

Finance and Operations pull the same report and get the same number. Until that happens, we have not been paid in full.

Pricing FAQ

The questions we get before the number lands

Why does the assessment cost money? Everyone else scopes for free.

Because a free scoping call produces a sales document and a paid assessment produces a number your departments have signed. Two weeks of interviews and source tracing is real work, and the output is useful to you whether or not you hire us for the build. It is also how we can quote a fixed price on the build at all. If we sign a Foundation Build within 90 days, the $5,000 comes off that price, so the only way it costs you anything is if we tell you not to build.

Why is the Foundation Build a range instead of one number?

Because the honest answer depends on how many source systems have to be reconciled and how far apart your current definitions are. We do not know that before the assessment, and neither does anyone quoting you a firm number without one. The assessment sets the price inside that range, and we put it in writing before you commit.

Can we skip the assessment and go straight to the build?

No. Pricing a fixed-fee build without measuring the data first is how consultants end up underwater and clients end up with change orders. The assessment is the actuary for the whole engagement.

What if we just want the monthly retainer?

That works when there is already a data layer worth maintaining. If your reporting estate grew report by report with no governance underneath, the retainer would mostly fund firefighting. The assessment tells us which situation you are in.

Who actually does the work?

Mitch Cauthron scopes every engagement, runs the discovery and design sessions where your departments agree on the numbers, and signs off on everything that ships. Project support and project management come in as the work needs it, under his direction. You get one accountable person from the first call to the final reconciliation, and you are never handed off after the sale, because there is no sales team to hand you off from.

You talk to Mitch.

Start with the assessment

Two weeks, $5,000, and a written diagnostic of where your numbers actually come from. Credited against the build if you go ahead. The discovery call is 30 minutes and costs nothing.

Want to see a finished engagement first? Read the case study