We started in 2013 with one consultant and a kitchen table. Today we are a team of five, still small enough to know every client by name, still focused on doing the work rather than selling the next project.
Gareth Milligan founded the firm after fifteen years in operational roles at manufacturing and logistics companies across Belfast and Glasgow. He kept seeing the same pattern: businesses would hire a large consultancy, receive a 120-page report, and then have no idea what to do with it. The report would sit in a drawer. Nothing changed.
He decided to do the opposite. Short recommendations. Clear owners. Weekly check-ins until the work is done. The first client was a 40-person food distributor whose warehouse costs were eating 22% of revenue. Within four months that number was down to 16%, mostly through route optimisation and renegotiated pallet storage rates.
Word spread. A second consultant joined in 2015, then a third in 2017. We opened our current office on Johnny Gardens in 2019 because working from kitchen tables stopped being practical once we were running six projects at once.
Today we take on roughly 30 engagements per year. We could do more, but we would rather finish what we start than juggle too many clients at once. Each project gets between 60 and 200 hours of senior consultant time, depending on scope.
These four principles shape how we run every engagement.
We spend the first two weeks of any project collecting data: financial records, process timings, staff interviews. Recommendations that skip this step are guesses, and we do not guess with your money.
Every recommendation we make comes with a target metric and a date. "Improve efficiency" is not a recommendation. "Reduce average order processing time from 14 minutes to 9 minutes by 1 March" is one. If we cannot attach a number, we drop the idea.
We do not hand over a report and disappear. Our standard engagement includes four weeks of implementation support after the final recommendations are delivered. That means sitting in on team meetings, troubleshooting problems and adjusting the plan when reality does not match the model.
Fixed fees, agreed in writing before work starts. If the scope grows, we re-quote and you decide whether to proceed. We have never sent a surprise invoice, and we never will.
Five people, each with direct industry experience before joining the firm.
Fifteen years in operations at food manufacturing and logistics firms before starting the practice. Gareth leads our financial performance and process redesign work. He holds a degree in business economics from Queen's University Belfast.
Joined in 2015 after eight years in retail operations management, including three years running a 200-employee distribution centre. Siobhán specialises in workforce planning and supply chain cost reduction.
A chartered management accountant who spent six years at a mid-tier audit firm before switching to advisory work. Rory builds the financial models that underpin our recommendations and runs our quarterly client review programme.
The team also includes Fiona Kerr, our project coordinator who keeps timelines and deliverables on track, and Daniel Osei, a junior analyst who joined in 2024 after completing his MBA at Ulster University. Between us we cover finance, operations, HR and market research without needing to subcontract.
A short timeline of how the firm has grown.
Gareth Milligan registers the firm and takes on the first client, a Belfast food distributor. The engagement saves the client £94,000 in annual warehouse costs.
Siobhán Daly joins. The firm completes its 30th project and begins working with clients outside Northern Ireland for the first time.
Rory Brennan joins, bringing chartered accountancy skills. The firm starts offering detailed financial performance analysis as a standalone service.
The team moves into 6 Johnny Gardens in North Pacochafield. Client meetings shift from coffee shops to a proper meeting room.
Cumulative client cost savings pass £14 million. The firm introduces a quarterly review programme for long-term clients.
Daniel Osei and Fiona Kerr join. The practice now handles up to 30 active engagements per year across the UK.
