What was the marine contractor's financial problem?

A $13.5M marine general contractor had no job costing and no per-project reporting. Four accounting staff, clean books, no visibility into which projects were profitable. The owner wanted to sell but couldn't prove sustainable profit to a buyer.

What did CFOS change?

SPM built job cost structure from scratch, tightened overhead spending that had never been reviewed, and installed twice-monthly per-project cost-to-complete reporting. Net profit went from 7 to 14 percent on the same revenue.

What was the financial outcome?

$917,000 per year in margin recovered. Business valuation increased from $2.3M to $5.5M in 9 months. Same revenue, same crews, $3.2M more in business value.

Does a marine contractor need to be selling to benefit from CFOS?

No. The financial infrastructure built for sale preparation is identical to what makes the business more profitable and manageable day to day. Sale readiness and operational health are the same work.

CASE STUDY — MARINE GENERAL CONTRACTOR

SAME REVENUE. SAME CREWS. $3.2M MORE IN BUSINESS VALUE.

QUICK ANSWER

A $13.5M marine general contractor knew the business was worth more than the valuation showed. The books were clean — they just didn't prove anything. SPM built job costing from scratch, tightened spending that had never been scrutinized, and installed twice-monthly per-project reporting. Net profit went from 7% to 14%. Valuation went from $2.3M to $5.5M. Same business. Better system.

$917K IN ANNUAL MARGIN RECOVERED. IN 9 MONTHS.

BY JOSH LUEBKER Published: June 2026 Updated: June 2026

The Problem

The owner of a $13.5M marine general contracting company wasn't in trouble. His crews were experienced. His GC relationships were strong. Work kept coming. But he wanted to sell — and when he looked at what the business was actually worth, the number wasn't there.

Four accounting staff, no job costing, no per-project reporting. The financials existed. They just didn't prove anything. A buyer doesn't pay for revenue. They pay for provable, sustainable profit — and this business couldn't prove it.

The valuation gap: At 7% net profit with disorganized books, the business appraised at $2.3M at a 2.5x multiple. The owner knew the business was worth more. He just couldn't show it.

What CFOS Found

NO JOB COSTING — BLIND ON EVERY PROJECTFour accounting staff processing payables and invoices. No job cost structure. No per-project margin reporting. Revenue came in. Costs went out. Nobody knew which projects were profitable. The books were clean — they just didn't say anything useful.

SPENDING THAT HAD NEVER BEEN SCRUTINIZEDSubscriptions, vendor relationships, material purchasing — all running on autopilot. Nobody had ever asked whether each line item was necessary. Not because the owner was careless, but because there was no system that surfaced the question.

NO REPORTING CADENCENo monthly review. No per-project reporting. No cost-to-complete. Leadership got information when they asked for it. By then the project was usually closed and there was nothing to do with the information.

What Changed

MONTH 1: JOB COST STRUCTURE BUILT FROM SCRATCHEvery active project got a job cost structure — labor by phase, material by spec, equipment by deployment. Costs that had been hitting the P&L as general expenses started hitting the right project buckets. Per-project margin was visible for the first time.

MONTH 1-2: SPENDING TIGHTENEDSPM reviewed every overhead line item. Subscriptions that weren't being used. Vendor relationships that had never been renegotiated. Material purchasing that wasn't being competitively sourced. None of it was dramatic. All of it was real money.

MONTH 2: TWICE-MONTHLY JOB REPORTINGEvery active project got a reporting cycle — cost-to-complete twice a month. Project managers could see where they were against budget. Problems surfaced when they were still addressable. The same revenue started generating more margin because nothing was hiding anymore.

MONTH 9: VALUATION REASSESSEDNine months of clean, documented profitability. Net profit from 7% to 14% on the same revenue. $917,000 per year in recovered margin that was already inside the business — it just wasn't visible before. Valuation: $5.5M at a 3x multiple.

The Outcome

KEY OUTCOMES — 9 MONTHS

7→14%

Net Profit Margin

$917K

Annual Margin Recovered

$2.3M→$5.5M

Business Valuation

9 Mo.

Time to Outcome

WHAT THIS MEANS

Same revenue. Same crews. Same work. $3.2M more in business value. The margin was already inside the business — it just wasn't being documented or managed. CFOS didn't change how the company operated. It made visible what was already happening so a buyer could pay for it.

No. The financial infrastructure CFOS installs for a sale preparation is the same infrastructure that makes the business more profitable, more manageable, and less dependent on the owner day to day. Sale readiness and operational health are the same thing built from the same work.

Yes. Marine GC work has specific financial characteristics — project duration, retainage structures, bonding requirements, and international payment cycles in some cases. SPM has worked with marine GCs doing $13M to $25M in revenue. The job cost structure and reporting cadence are adapted to the marine project lifecycle, not a generic subcontractor template.

The $917K came from three sources: spending that had never been scrutinized (subscriptions, vendor pricing, material sourcing), costs that had been misallocated to overhead instead of jobs making overhead look inflated and jobs look more profitable than they were, and margin that was being left on the table because nobody was tracking cost-to-complete in real time. None of it required new revenue. It was already there.

SAME REVENUE. SAME CREWS. $3.2M MORE IN BUSINESS VALUE.

The Problem

What CFOS Found

What Changed

The Outcome

YOUR BUSINESS IS WORTH MORE THAN IT'S PROVING.