The Business News

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October 25, 2010 www.thebusinessnewsonline.com Vol. 8, No. 13 $1.00

Foxwood’s business is to help with business

Mike Fabich and Greg Gauthier lead a team of business advisors at Foxwood Associates, 1950
Paint Horse Trail, De Pere. The Business News photo by Paul Schroeder

De Pere company provides management advisory services to companies

By Paul Schroeder turnover may manifest as the pressing issue, “When times are bad, you would expect to

pschroeder@thebusinessnewsonline.com
“We help companies get from wherever
they are to wherever they want to be,”
said Greg Gauthier, a partner at Foxwood
Associates.
“Sometimes, that means that a company
is in crisis and they want to get healthy,”
added Mike Fabich, managing partner of
the firm. “Other times it simply means that
“
We help companies get from
wherever they are to wherever
they want to be.
– Greg Gauthier, partner of
Foxwood Associates, Green Bay
we find that these symptoms usually lead back
to root causes of leadership and managing the
change process.”
A one-sized-fits-all solution doesn’t work
in their business. “All solutions have to be
practical, Fabich said. “They have to be doable
within the context of what the company has to
work with. That may be resources — human
resources, financial resources, physical assets .
. . but it has to be practical in that the company
hear from companies that weren’t doing well,”
Fabich said. “However, because of so much
uncertainty in the marketplace, about a third of
the inquiries we receive are from companies
that were doing well before but because of the
down economy now are not doing as well.”
Foxwood Associates also started an equity
investment business last year to search for
local companies in which to gain an equity
stake. “We did this for several reasons,”

the company isn’t meeting expectations and
wants to improve and get to a better place. In
either case, our job is to help them navigate
through the issues that have prevented better
performance.”
Foxwood Associates provides management
advisory services to private companies with
sales in the $5-$25 million range. “That said,
our work is not limited to those companies,”
Gauthier said. “We have also consulted with
companies that have $700 million in annual
revenue and those with $.5 million in revenue.”
Mike Fabich, managing partner started the
business in the metro Milwaukee area in 2001.
He relocated the company to Northeastern
Wisconsin in 2003.
“I was working with a client there. and
it just made sense to move operations to the
Green Bay area,” Fabich said. Greg Gauthier
became a partner in the company in 2005 after
selling the manufacturing business he ran for
ten years.
“I had a desire to do something else,”
”
Gauthier said. “I had been doing pro bono
advising for the Small Business Development
Center in Green Bay and enjoyed it, so joining
Foxwood seemed like a logical next step.”
Foxwood Associates has a staff of six
advisors. In addition to a broad, cross-
functional approach to business issues, they
offer practices in finance, human capital,
leadership and organizational development.
“Each of us have between 20-25 years
experience performing the work we advise
in,” Fabich said.
“We work on the fundamentals of
business, and these fundamentals are common
across all industry sectors,” Gauthier said.
“To one degree or another, the concepts of
leadership and change are present in every
engagement we have,” Fabich said. “Although
other symptoms like poor sales or employee
must have the time to do it themselves. We
have to work with a company based upon what
works for them. The solutions must generate
results.”
The solutions offered can be very difficult
at times. Both agree that the two hardest
recommendations they have ever offered to
a company president was to let a trusted
employee go or to shut down the business
altogether.
“Sometimes, what’s best for the owner
is to go out of business. And for someone
that has an emotional investment combined
with a financial investment to a business, a
recommendation like that can be extremely
devastating to hear,” Gauthier said.
A key benefit offered by Foxwood
Associates is their approach to management
consulting. “We do more than write a report
and leave the company to figure out how to
use the information,” Fabich said.
The economy is having an effect on the type
of businesses contacting Foxwood Associates.
Fabich said. “First of all, we’re operators.
We enjoy running businesses. That’s what
makes us good advisors. Second, we are
looking for situations that match our advisory
abilities. It may seem surprising, but none
of the companies we have advised are ones
we considered for equity investment. The
criteria are different. The third thing we look
at is keeping a local company local. Having
worked in and led a variety of companies,
we know the importance and impact local
ownership has on a community.”
Foxwood currently has no equity stake in any
company although they have looked at eight.
“We determined that six of the companies we
looked at just did not meet our specific criteria
for entering into an equity investment,” Fabich
said. “However, we are still looking at two
and are confident others meeting our criteria
are out there.”

Reprinted with permission of The Business News