Cut burn 30% without stalling growth
The founder came to Alfred with a board ultimatum: extend the runway by cutting roughly a third of monthly spend — but do it without slowing the growth the next round depends on. Alfred took in the full context of the company first: the P&L line by line, the unit economics, and which spend was actually buying growth versus simply funding habit. Only then did the real question come into focus.
The situation
The instinct in the room was to cut the things that were easiest to measure — marketing first, headcount next. Alfred pushed back. He separated spend that compounds from spend that merely recurs, then advised the founder to protect the two channels carrying retention and re-rank everything else. The outcome: burn down 31%, growth held, and a board memo that made every cut defensible.
So what actually makes a cut safe?
The runway has to actually move.
Growth-driving spend stays untouched.
Focus on unit economics & retention.
Every cut has to be defensible to the board.
Want to see the decision as it moves?
Alfred doesn't hand you a static PDF and disappear. As the cuts land, he keeps a live view of burn, runway and the growth metrics they touch — so the founder could watch the runway extend week by week and catch any cut that started to bite before it cost them a customer.
For this founder, Alfred stood up a running board view that tracked every line he'd advised trimming against the growth it was meant to protect, flagged in real time the moment a number drifted off plan.
A live read on burn, runway and growth
