The Founding 20 · Launch Cohort · 20 places
Most founders confuse hiring a CMO with running marketing.
A CMO hire takes six months to ramp and costs $300–500K. An agency retainer delivers content. The board asks for pipeline. The gap between those two things is where most growth budgets disappear.
We built Tommy and Spartan because we could not find the firm that closed that gap. Two named directors, one marketing and one strategy, running as one operating model, with seven quality gates ensuring every output reaches your desk at board standard.
Corporate Advisory · Autonomous · Agentic
Recent work
Two ways to work with us
For your marketing
The Marketing OS
Tommy and Spartan as your marketing and strategy team. From ICP to campaign, shipped weekly and measured against revenue. Start with The Founding 20, a retainer, or self-serve.
See the Enterprise Engine →For your people
Spartan Training
AI training systems. Coach your team on their real work, up a measured ladder, and keep a process-improvement library your own staff wrote plus capability your board can see.
Explore Spartan Training →The cost of the gap
$300–500K
CMO hire
Six months to ramp. The window closes while you wait.
$5–15K/mo
Agency retainer
A team of experts, billed by the hour. Ships content, reports activity. Ask for the revenue and you get a testimonial.
90 days
The window
The Series A data room fills with activity and empties of evidence.
Marketing should compound, not pulse.
The founders who close the loop, from ICP signal to signed mandate, win the category. Everyone else fills the gap with activity.
A new kind of firm
Tommy is your marketing director, built as software.
ICP definition. Brand narrative. Content strategy. Campaign mandate, from angle-first brief to ship. Tommy does not wait to be briefed. Tommy reads the signal and activates the team.
Spartan is your strategy director, built as software.
Business model interrogation. Unit economics. Competitive positioning. Every mandate Tommy proposes, Spartan tests. Nothing moves without both co-leads aligned.
Seven quality gates. Nothing ships without passing Simon.
Audience fit, factual integrity, brand consistency, visual quality, IP protection. All deterministic, all automatic. Quality is not a human bottleneck. It is a system guarantee.
Twenty places · No risk · Now open
The Founding 20.
Twenty founding client places. Thirty days of work, delivered in full and free. You pay only at Day 30, and only if we hit the success metrics we agree together in discovery. No retainer to sign first, no risk to carry. A development partnership, not a pitch.
$0
Discovery
30-minute diagnostic. One recommended starting point, sent in writing.
Free
30-Day Engagement
Thirty days of work, delivered in full. You pay the US$15K success fee at Day 30, and only if we hit the metrics we agreed in discovery.
$5–15K/mo
Operating Retainer
51 specialists live on every mandate. Signal-to-Revenue loop running monthly.
Apply for The Founding 20.
Twenty places. Once they're gone, the no-risk founding engagement closes. Every Founding 20 application reviewed by a senior partner within 48 hours.
Thank you for applying to The Founding 20.
We review every application personally within 48 hours and will be in touch by email. There are 20 places. If you are accepted, we will confirm your place directly.