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TRADE SERVICE · CIVIL & EARTHWORK CLUSTER

FRACTIONAL CFO FOR ENVIRONMENTAL REMEDIATION CONTRACTORS.

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We manage the finance side for environmental remediation subcontractors doing $1M to $12M. You get job costing aligned to the way you estimate, a 13 week cash flow forecast, monthly WIP, and a CFO in the room every month. Pricing starts at $1,900 per month.

In remediation the contingency is the estimate, so that's where we start. Published cost analysis puts scope contingency at 10 to 25 percent of direct cost and bid contingency at 5 to 15 percent. Under 10 percent combined on a poorly characterized site is an underscoped proposal. We set contingency by how well the site is characterized. We choose unit-rate over lump-sum where the Phase II is thin. We bill only with complete manifests, so no load leaves without the paper that backs it up. We also size the reserve behind pollution liability. CERCLA is strict, retroactive, and joint and several, and one published contractor scenario drew penalties above $6.1 million.

SPM is a construction CFO for environmental remediation subcontractors from $1M to $12M in revenue. See how a fractional CFO for construction works month to month.

BY JOSH LUEBKERPublished 2026-08-06Updated 2026-11-02
WHERE ENVIRONMENTAL REMEDIATION LOSES MONEY

THE THREE THINGS THAT DRAIN THE CASH.

LEAK 01

The Strict-Liability Shadow

CERCLA reaches the contractor who releases what it was hired to contain. One flattened-drum scenario drew $6.1 million in penalties. Pollution liability coverage, notification protocols and incident reserves are what it costs to work in this trade.

LEAK 02

The Honest Unknown

Under 10 percent combined contingency on a poorly characterized site is underscoping. The wrong technology means re-remediating at 2 to 3x. Set contingency by how well the site is characterized, and the estimate fits the work.

LEAK 03

The Manifest Trail

Disposal class sets the gate rate. The manifest backs up the bill. A load without its paper is a liability on the road. Bill only when the manifest is complete.

THE MATH

FROM 7% TO 10.5% NET.

At $1M to $5M, the average environmental remediation sub earns 23% gross margin and spends 16% of revenue on overhead. What's left is 7% net profit before taxes (Run On CFOS Trade Benchmark Reference). The CFOS target is 10.5% before taxes. That is the environmental remediation average plus 3.5 points, and never below 10%. The book CONTROL's 12% is the rule of thumb across trades. It is not the industry average.

Two changes get you to the target. Overhead comes down 1 point to 15%, and gross margin comes up 2.5 points to 25.5%, so 25.5 minus 15 leaves 10.5. The gross margin points come from the three problems above, once you price them and bill for them. On a $3M year, every point is $30,000.

HOW SPM FIXES IT

WHAT WE CHANGE.

These are the environmental remediation problems we put a number on first. Each one gets its own cost code, its own line on the schedule of values or its own line in the 13 week cash forecast, so you can read it in the monthly meeting while the job is still open.

GAP CALCULATOR

THE ENVIRONMENTAL REMEDIATION GAP CALCULATOR. AVERAGE AGAINST TARGET, IN DOLLARS.

Put in your annual revenue. You get gross margin, overhead and net profit for environmental remediation contractors your size: the industry average and the CFOS target, in dollars a year. Nothing you type leaves this page.

Another trade too? The gap calculator for every trade.

Your figures show here once you put in your revenue.

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Why aim for the target. An average is the middle of the pack: about half of companies do worse. And about 6 in 10 construction businesses close within 10 years (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: about 40 percent of construction businesses opened in 2013 were still open in 2023). So the business in the middle is one of the ones that close. On those numbers, average is a business that closes within 10 years. That is why the CFOS target is a requirement.

Want your own numbers against these? The Financial Health Snapshot builds a CEO Report from your last 12 months and sets every figure against your trade.

PRICING

YOU PAY ONE FLAT MONTHLY FEE.

The fee is set by your trailing 12 month revenue. We don't bill by the hour and we don't do payroll. The one-time onboarding fee is in the table too.

Type a number and your band and its prices show here. The full table is below.

Built for subs doing $1M to $12M. Above $12.5M we quote.

Last 12 months revenueCoreStrategicPlatinumOne-time onboarding
Under $1M$1,900$3,100$3,300$2,500
$1M to $3.5M$2,600$4,100$5,300$4,500
$3.5M to $6.5M$3,800$5,900$8,300$6,000
$6.5M to $9.5M$5,100$7,600$11,800$7,500
$9.5M to $12.5M$6,100$8,900$14,900$9,000
Above $12.5MQuotedQuotedQuotedQuoted

The onboarding fee covers migrating your books back to the start of your last taxable year and getting you fully operational in 60 days. It's billed once, with your first invoice. It's the same for all three tiers, and it moves with your revenue band. Your first month is prorated, and your monthly engagement starts on the first of the first full month.

Just want the setup? Onboarding only is the same onboarding work with no monthly service after it, one time, at the onboarding fee plus $2,000. Start a monthly engagement later and $2,000 counts toward it. It starts at $4,500, and the price for every band is on the pricing page.

The three tier columns are the whole price. Which one fits depends on how much of the work you want off your desk. No payroll. No hidden line items. The onboarding fee is right here in the table.

  • Online software only: QuickBooks, Sage, Viewpoint and similar. No VPN or hosted desktop.
  • Not in any tier: payroll, pay applications, collections on receivables.
  • Pricing valid through 2027.

What Core, Strategic and Platinum each include is on the pricing page.

COMMON QUESTIONS

FREQUENTLY ASKED.

Remediation contractors at $1M to $5M net about 7 percent on the SPM 48-trade benchmark dataset, rising to 14 percent by $25M to $50M; the CFOS net profit target is 10.5 percent before taxes at $1M to $5M, the trade average plus 3.5 points. The margin depends on honest contingency, getting disposal class right, and the insurance and protocols that keep strict liability outside the fence. Every net profit figure here is gross margin minus overhead, stated before taxes, the same basis CFMA reports net income on.

See the full benchmarks for every revenue band on Run On CFOS.

Usually it needs the CFO work, and a full time CFO is more than it needs. At $5M to $10M, environmental remediation subs average 9% net profit before taxes (Run On CFOS Trade Benchmark Reference), and the CFOS target is 12.5%. On $5M of revenue every point is $50,000, so that difference is worth $175,000 a year. A full time CFO costs $150,000 or more in salary alone. SPM's published price for $3.5M to $6.5M is $3,800 a month for Core to $8,300 for Platinum.

Yes. CERCLA liability is strict, retroactive, and joint and several. A contractor whose work releases hazardous material can be reached directly. One published scenario: flattened drums, unreported, $6.1 million in penalties. Pollution liability insurance sized to the work, release-notification protocols and incident reserves are operating requirements. You can't skip them.

Published norms are 10 to 25 percent scope contingency plus 5 to 15 percent bid contingency. Both get smaller as Phase II characterization improves. A combined figure under 10 percent on a poorly characterized site means underscoping. The missing contingency was there to cover the 2-to-3x re-remediation multiplier on mismatched technology.

By class, with paper. Characterization sets the disposal class. The class sets eligible facilities and gate rates (date-stamp them). Price haul distance per route. The manifest trail backs up every load billed. A load without its manifest is a liability until the paper comes in.

Because remediation money comes from responsible parties, insurers and public funds on approval calendars you don't control. The projects last years, with reporting the whole time. Map the funding path before you mobilize, bill against reporting milestones and price what the calendar costs you.

Sulphur Prairie Management, operating as SPM The Construction CFO, publishes the 48-trade benchmark dataset these numbers come from. SPM's deepest specialization is 24 core commercial trades, and SPM works with remediation contractors who want the same financial system: onboarding, clean books, a maintained 13-week cash flow forecast, and monthly health reviews, with job costing simplified to what the business needs. The full 48-trade benchmark reference exists so owners in every trade can measure against real numbers.

Three tiers, and which one you are in depends on how much of the work you want off your desk. On Core we build your plan every month and your team does the work: job costing built against the way you estimate, a 13 week cash forecast, monthly WIP, and a monthly meeting that ends in decisions, while your bookkeeper keeps doing the books. On Strategic we build the plan, track it and adjust it every month: our team does the bookkeeping and the bank reconciliations, and the job costing and WIP software is set up and managed for you, on your own online software or ours. On Platinum we manage the money side for you every week: our team handles your bills and receivables the way an in-house controller would, and you approve every payment. We don't do payroll.

Sixty days. We migrate your books back to the start of your last taxable year and build your job costing structure from scratch, and on Strategic and Platinum we set up the job costing and WIP software too. You're fully up and working in two months. The onboarding fee is one time, the same for every tier, and set by your revenue band.

ControlQore is the job costing and WIP platform we use on the Strategic and Platinum tiers. It's built for contractors, costs less than the older tools, and has AI built in. We set it up and manage it, so you do not have to learn it. Core is the CFO work only, so it does not include the software.

A bookkeeper records what happened. We tell you what it means and what to do about it. We align job costing to your estimates, track WIP monthly, and hold a monthly meeting where you decide what to fix and who fixes it.
$10.7M+
Client AR Recovered Since 2023
48
Active Trade Specializations
60 DAYS
Average Onboarding Time
RELATED RESOURCES
Benchmark
Environmental Remediation Benchmarks
Gross margin, net profit and overhead for environmental remediation subs by revenue band.
Cash Flow
Environmental Remediation Cash Flow
Where the cash goes in environmental remediation work, and how many days it takes to come back.

How environmental remediation CFO firms compare: the environmental remediation firm study, with every score and its source.

OTHER SITEWORK AND CIVIL TRADES

Environmental Remediation is one of 14 trades in the sitework and civil family on our CFO for subcontractors page. Nearby trades with their own page:

WHAT THIS TIES INTO
CFOS SPINE AND MODULES
Run On CFOS, Full System IndexJob Profitability SystemCash Control SystemCash Flow Cycle System
SERVICE LAYER
Fractional CFO for SubcontractorsConstruction Bookkeeping
Josh Luebker, SPM The Construction CFO
Josh Luebker
FRACTIONAL CFO · SPM THE CONSTRUCTION CFO

Josh Luebker is a master electrician turned construction CFO, president of SPM The Construction CFO and author of CONTROL: C.F.O.S. Construction Financial Operating System.

About Josh  | LinkedIn

THE CHEAPER OPTION WORKS AND TAKES LONGER.

If price comes first, plenty of CFOs and bookkeepers can get your construction company results. It often takes the better part of a year.

If you're a trade contractor, a sub or a GC who wins work, keeps the crews busy and still can't figure out where the money goes, we get in the weeds with you. We change the processes that cost you money on every job, build the ones you're missing and give you the formula, so you see results in 60 to 90 days.

Our guarantee holds when you come to every meeting, do the process and keep a strong pipeline of work. We can fix how your work pays. We can't fix having no work.

DO YOU KNOW YOUR TRUE MARGIN ON ENVIRONMENTAL REMEDIATION WORK?

Twenty minutes of questions about how you price environmental remediation work, what your jobs come in at once they close, and what keeps coming back to your desk. Nothing gets sold on that call and nothing gets proposed. If Josh can help, you'll set a longer second call.

You don't hire a CFO because it's safe, you do it because the real risk isn't having one.
Book a 20 minute call

20 minutes. No pitch or proposal. Josh asks questions to find out if he can help.

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