You Don't Want a CFO.
You Want to Know the Next Right Move.
That's what I build for owner and founder-led companies under $50MM on the California coast: the numbers, the read, and the judgment, at whatever depth the decision needs. Founder and Fractional CFO, 20+ years building finance functions that turn numbers into decisions.
Numbers Are Only Worth What They Change
A report that tells you what's wrong and walks away is worse than no report. Everything I produce, from a market read to running your whole finance function, ends the same way: with a decision you can act on and a path forward.
How close I get depends on what the decision needs. For many owners the right help is intelligence and judgment that sharpen a call they are already making: a read on where buyers are going, what they cost to win, where the leaks are. I bring the analysis and the experience; you stay in the driver's seat. That work is built to be the front door to everything else.
When the stakes are higher, I get closer. Engage puts a CFO in your room while your team keeps running the books. Manage is your finance department, run by us: close, cash, dashboards, the whole machine, so you can go run the business. Same judgment, more involvement.
My career spans subscription ecommerce, retail, and institutional finance, so I have seen what works and what breaks at every stage of growth. Today that experience is focused on owner and founder-led businesses under $50MM on the California coast, in four verticals I know well: DTC ecommerce, wineries, health and wellness, and elective medicine. These are operators who have outgrown their current finance setup. The close takes too long, the data is unreliable, and the owner is making decisions without real numbers. I fix that.
Before Main Street IQ, I spent 12 years at Northern Trust in institutional finance: modeling, M&A due diligence, and ERP implementation. I served as a Navy officer first. Main Street IQ is veteran-owned and operated. MBA from Pepperdine's Graziadio School of Business.
Watch Gang
CFO | $40M Subscription Ecommerce
- 5% CAC reduction
- 7% retention increase
- 40% faster close cycle
- 22% ARR growth with 12% OPEX reduction
Haberdash
CFO, VP Operations | Luxury Menswear Retailer
- Restructured sales compensation: 23% sales increase, 9% comp expense reduction
- Led Shopify migration with 30% ecommerce revenue growth
Northern Trust
12 Years | Institutional Finance
- Financial modeling and analysis
- M&A due diligence
- ERP implementation
Two Ways I Work With Owners
I augment your leadership
A report, an audit, an ongoing read on your market and your numbers. You make the calls; I make sure you are making them with corporate-grade information instead of a gut feel. This is the Discover, Diagnose, and Monitor work.
I advise alongside your team
When you want a CFO in the decisions, not just in your inbox. Engage puts me in the room beside the finance staff you already have. Manage is your finance department, run by us. This is the Advise work.
You do not have to know which one you need on day one. Start with a single piece of intelligence and let the relationship find its level.
Core Capabilities
Every engagement is tailored, but these are the levers I pull most often.
Finance Function Design
Build a finance function that is redundant, agile, intelligent, and data-driven: the operating model that scales with your business. See the RAID framework →
Finance Function Optimization
Streamline month-end close, automate reporting, and give leadership real-time visibility into cash, margins, and KPIs.
Marketing Analytics Integration
Connect marketing spend to financial outcomes. CAC, LTV, ROAS, and cohort analysis tied directly to the P&L.
Supply Chain Strategy
Inventory optimization, vendor negotiation, and landed cost analysis that protect margins through growth.
Organizational Design
Structure teams, define roles, and build accountability frameworks that eliminate single points of failure.
AI Automation & Custom Tools
Beyond the spreadsheets. Custom dashboards, automated reporting, competitor intelligence scrapers, mobile apps, and landing pages. Real builds, not slide decks: AI and automation applied to the actual bottlenecks in your business.
What I'm Not
Not another CPA offering "fractional CFO services" as a side dish. Not a bookkeeper stretching into advisory. Not a generic consultant with a deck full of frameworks.
I'm a CFO. Depending on what you need, I either hand you the intelligence to decide well, or I get in the room and decide it with you.
CPAs do taxes. Bookkeepers do records. I do the judgment in between.
If your current provider hasn't rebuilt anything in your finance function in the last six months, they're a controller. Let's talk.
What founders ask about Scott
Founder of Main Street IQ. Twenty-plus years of CFO experience across subscription ecommerce, retail, and institutional finance. CFO at Watch Gang ($40M subscription ecommerce), CFO and VP Operations at Haberdash (luxury menswear), 12 years at Northern Trust in institutional finance (modeling, M&A due diligence, ERP implementation). U.S. Navy veteran. MBA from Pepperdine's Graziadio School of Business.
Two reasons. Operationally, military service trains discipline, structure, and reliability under pressure; finance work for owner-operators requires the same. Structurally, veteran-owned status is a real accountability commitment to clients and to the federal contracting framework. Main Street IQ LLC is veteran-owned and operated.
We are not a marketing agency. We do not run your ads, build your website, or write your blog posts. We tell you what is actually happening, what to do about it, and (for Engage and Manage clients) sit in the room while you decide. Execution stays with your team or your vetted partners. The fee is for judgment, not for selling you services you do not need.