Serving Los Angeles Businesses Virtually
Fractional CFO and CMO — Los Angeles and Orange County
Local Fractional provides partner-led fractional CFO and CMO services to Los Angeles businesses generating $2M–$50M in revenue. The Fractional CFO Partnership is a flat $5,000–$10,000+/month retainer (with a lighter $2,500/month Fractional Executive Advisory tier for businesses with clean books), delivered remote-first to Los Angeles businesses, with travel for board meetings, planning, and other key on-site moments. Co-founders Chris Gauvin and Taber Wetz lead every engagement directly.
Dallas-based financial and marketing leadership, delivered virtually to Los Angeles businesses at Dallas pricing.
Why would an LA business hire a CFO who isn't in California?
Because a Los Angeles cost base is priced into most local firms’ fees and it does not do anything for your business. We are a Texas firm, we do not keep an office in California, and we price on scope rather than postcode — so an LA client pays what a Texas one pays for the same work. That is the honest version of the pitch.
What is worth interrogating instead is who does the work. A great many firms serving Southern California match you to a consultant from a bench, and the person who wins the engagement is not the person who runs it. Every Local Fractional engagement is led personally by a founding partner — Chris Gauvin or Taber Wetz — with controller-level support underneath where the books need rebuilding rather than just reporting. The same person is in the room in month one and in month thirty.
LA engagements run remote-first, the way they do for our clients nationwide, with travel for board meetings, investor conversations and diligence. Cloud accounting means a remote CFO sees precisely what an in-office one would; what determines whether the arrangement works is cadence — a standing session where decisions actually get made — not proximity. See how the engagement model works.
The one genuinely local variable is California itself: multi-state payroll and nexus, a materially different labour-cost structure, and industry-specific revenue recognition in entertainment and consumer products. Those are questions about competence, not about zip code.
The Los Angeles Business Landscape
Los Angeles is the second-largest metro economy in the United States. It is a market defined by scale and diversity — entertainment and media, consumer packaged goods, e-commerce, professional services, and a massive trades and construction sector driven by relentless housing demand. Businesses here grow fast, and the ones that survive do so by getting their financial and operational infrastructure right early.
Many LA businesses hit a familiar inflection point: revenue is growing, but the founder is still managing the books, the marketing strategy is reactive rather than planned, and there is no financial model guiding decisions. They need CFO-level and CMO-level guidance, but a full-time executive hire at California compensation levels is not realistic for a company doing $2M–$50M in revenue.
The cost advantage of working with a Texas-based firm is especially pronounced for California companies. You are already paying California overhead on your employees, your rent, and your taxes. Your fractional executive does not need to add to that burden. Dallas-based expertise at Dallas pricing means you get senior leadership without the California markup — and that difference compounds over the life of an engagement.
Los Angeles and Orange County Areas We Serve
Greater LA and Orange County are served as one region on identical terms — no travel surcharge, and no difference in access between a Santa Monica client and one in Irvine. What changes between them is the shape of the business, and the reporting follows the business rather than the postcode.
Downtown LA & Century City
Professional services, real estate and the firms that orbit them. Partner distributions, entity-level consolidation and management accounts an investor will accept without a rewrite are the recurring asks.
Santa Monica & the Westside
Venture-backed technology and consumer brands, where reporting is built around runway, burn and unit economics rather than utilisation — and has to survive an investor reading it line by line.
Irvine, Newport Beach & Orange County
A market large enough to stand on its own: medical devices, technology, professional services and a deep base of established family-held operators. Multi-entity consolidation and succession planning come up here more than anywhere else in Southern California.
Pasadena & Glendale
Healthcare practices, engineering firms and long-horizon family businesses. These are frequently first-time CFO engagements where the immediate need is a close that closes on time and a 13-week cash view before anything strategic.
Burbank & the San Fernando Valley
Production companies, post houses and the service businesses around them. Project accounting and revenue recognition against delivery milestones drive the finance workload, and both are routinely handled on instinct.
El Segundo & the South Bay
Aerospace suppliers, logistics and technical services, where contract accounting and cash timing against milestone billing are the whole of the problem.
Long Beach & the harbour
Logistics, distribution and light industrial tied to the port. Inventory timing and customer concentration drive most of the cash risk, and neither shows up on a standard P&L.
Consumer brands and ecommerce, across the region
Southern California's DTC and consumer-products base has a recurring blind spot: a blended acquisition cost that hides one channel subsidising three, and inventory decisions made on gut. See our ecommerce practice.
How Virtual Delivery Works
If you can use Zoom, we can work together. Our clients in Los Angeles get the same weekly check-ins, financial reporting, and strategic guidance as our Dallas clients. The two-hour time difference is a non-issue — we schedule around it every day.
Every engagement starts with a deep-dive into your business: financials, operations, competitive landscape, and goals. From there, we build a working rhythm — typically weekly or biweekly calls, shared dashboards, and async communication through Slack or email as needed.
The virtual model is not new for us. It is how we have delivered results for clients across the country since day one. You get the same rigor and responsiveness as a local hire — without the California price tag.
What does a fractional CMO do for a Los Angeles business?
Los Angeles has no shortage of marketing spend and a real shortage of people who can say which of it produced profitable revenue. A fractional CMO owns that answer: positioning, the offer, channel mix, funnel maths, and the discipline of killing what does not work. It is an executive seat, not an agency retainer — and in a market this saturated with agencies, that distinction matters.
This side of the firm is led by our marketing partner. It neither requires nor assumes a CFO engagement. When clients do run both, the effect is a single monthly answer to two questions companies usually ask separately: what did marketing cost, and what did it earn.
Typical Southern California engagements sit with DTC and consumer brands whose blended acquisition cost is hiding one channel subsidising three, with B2B and technology companies needing a pipeline model an investor will accept rather than a dashboard of activity, and with studios and agencies where account profitability drives everything and nobody is measuring it.
The fractional CMO page covers scope, process, and current pricing. If the numbers themselves are the problem, the CFO engagement is the better first move.
Who you will actually work with
Worth being concrete about, because it is the difference that matters most. A great many firms match you to a consultant from a bench, and the person who wins the engagement is not the person who runs it. Here every engagement is led personally by a founding partner — the same person in month one and in month thirty.
Chris Gauvin
Co-Founder & Fractional CFO
Leads finance engagements personally — monthly close, cash-flow forecasting, lender and board reporting, and exit preparation.
Taber Wetz
Co-Founder & Fractional CFO
Leads finance engagements personally, with a focus on forecasting, pricing and margin work, and preparing a business to be sold.
Melissa Valdez
Fractional CMO
Leads the marketing practice — positioning, channel mix and the funnel maths that says which spend actually produced revenue.
Explainers
The questions that come up before anyone signs anything, answered in one picture each.
Fractional vs Interim vs Full-Time CFO
Three different instruments. Which one your situation actually calls for.
What a Fractional CFO Costs
The three tiers, what each includes, and why we price on scope not location.
CFO + CMO: Who Owns What
Two silos, one bridge. Marketing knows what it spent; finance knows what came back.
Your First 90 Days
Books cleaned, a cash view you can rely on, then the decisions those two change.
The 13-Week Cash Flow Forecast
Cash in, cash out, and the balance week by week — far enough ahead to act.
Los Angeles and Orange County — Common Questions
What fractional CFO services are available in Los Angeles, CA?
Monthly close and management reporting, 13-week cash-flow forecasting, budgeting and variance analysis, KPI scorecards, lender and investor reporting, pricing and margin work, and exit or sale preparation. Engagements run as a fixed monthly scope rather than an hourly rate, so the cost is predictable from month one.
Do you have an office in Los Angeles?
No, and we would rather say so than imply otherwise. We are a Texas firm serving clients across the country, and LA engagements run remote-first with travel for board meetings, investor conversations and diligence. Cloud accounting means a remote CFO sees precisely what an in-office one would. What determines whether it works is cadence, not proximity — and a Los Angeles cost base priced into a local firm's fees does nothing for your business.
Do you serve Irvine and Orange County as well as Los Angeles?
Yes, and Orange County is substantial enough that we treat it as its own market rather than as an LA suburb. Irvine, Newport Beach, Costa Mesa and Anaheim engagements skew toward medical devices, technology and established family-held operators, where multi-entity consolidation and succession planning come up more than anywhere else in Southern California.
Do you work with Los Angeles nonprofits?
Yes. Nonprofit finance carries requirements a commercial book does not — restricted versus unrestricted funds, grant reporting, functional expense allocation, and a board that has to read the statements without an accounting background. We treat that as its own specialism rather than as a variation on commercial reporting.
Can you help an ecommerce or DTC brand in Los Angeles?
Yes, and it is one of the clearest places a fractional CFO earns the fee. The recurring blind spot is a blended acquisition cost that conceals one channel subsidising three, alongside inventory decisions made on instinct. Contribution margin by channel and by SKU, and an inventory model that respects lead times, usually change the decisions within a quarter.
Do you offer fractional CMO services in Los Angeles as well?
Yes, and it is a separate discipline led by our marketing partner rather than a CFO wearing a second hat. It runs alongside a CFO engagement or entirely on its own. In a market this saturated with agencies, the distinction that matters is that a CMO owns the outcome rather than the campaign.
How much does a fractional CFO cost in Los Angeles?
We price on scope rather than on location, so Los Angeles rates match our Texas rates — which is rather the point. Most engagements land well below the fully loaded cost of a full-time CFO once salary, bonus, benefits and payroll taxes are counted, and well below what a comparable Southern California firm charges for the same scope.
Does working with a remote CFO actually work?
It is how the large majority of our clients work with us, across the country. Modern accounting systems are cloud-based, so a remote CFO sees exactly what an in-office one would. What matters far more is the cadence — a standing monthly or fortnightly session where decisions actually get made.
Ready to Talk?
No pitch, just a conversation about your business and where you want to take it. We will figure out together if there is a fit.
Book a Free ConsultationOr email info@localfractional.com