Today we’d like to introduce you to Kasey Grelle
Hi Kasey, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I started my career as a TV news reporter and anchor in Missoula, Montana. After cutting my teeth there, I got a job at KSDK as a multimedia reporter and was on the morning and evening news. Sometime around 2011, I had a moment where I realized (while standing on an overpass at 4am, telling people it was snowing and to wear a coat), that this wasn’t my calling. I decided to go get my MBA and figure out my next career move. I ended up at WashU (my undergrad alma matter) and focusing on entrepreneurship/finance. During the program, I started working as Cultivation Capital’s director of investor relations and part of their diligence team. I worked my way up through Cultivation, eventually becoming a principal in their tech fund post-graduation. I loved the work, but wanted more direct operational experience. I took a role doing M&A at the Answers.com spinoff company, Gateway Media (since renamed Quillt). After buying 2 businesses during my first year, it became clear the business lacked strategy and was in trouble. The business model started to fail and our CEO at the time stepped away; I stepped in to pick up the pieces, rebuild the business and pay off $40m in debt. It took several years, but i turned the business around and sold it to a new private equity firm. I spent a year in the transition, but eventually decided to step away to focus on something new.
That’s when Jesse Pujji and I reconnected and started working on the idea of what would eventually become Aux. Jesse’s background is in growth marketing (and before that consulting, investment banking). My experience in growth marketing at Quillt + my experience in M&A/diligence/investing gave us a unique perspective that there was a misunderstanding/miscommunication between the way marketers translate their efforts into financal metrics CEOs/CFOs/board members/private equity can understand. We decided to step in to fix that.
Aux works directly with private equity firms to help diligence their potential investments through the lens of digital marketing/digital growth opportunities, quantifying the risks and growth opportunities. Once the PE firm buys the company, we come in to help put those growth strategies in place.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Ha, no.
It’s been a rollercoaster of ups and downs. There have been things I’ve loved about every step along the way, but it hasn’t been smooth. I’ve learned the hard way from my mistakes;. I’ve also felt the highs and lows of being an entrepreneur. The ups and downs of the initial phases of launching our business were big and happened over and over with regularity. The business is on a much more stable trajectory now, but those highs and lows have helped me appreciate the journey to get here.
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Aux operates at the intersection between private equity and marketing. We’re a strategic growth marketing consulting firm uniquely focused on private equity. We help marketers translate their efforts into their impact on revenue and EBITDA, and help investors quantify and understand how to use digital growth strategies to supercharge their investments.
We do so through three primary service offerings: due diligence, value creation services, and placing fractional growth teams inside our target companies.
Can you talk to us a bit about happiness and what makes you happy?
My husband and kids, first and foremost. I am a mom to a 10 year old boy, 8 year old girl and 5 year old boy. It’s wild, crazy, and busy in our house… but I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Professionally, I love solving problems. I love the Tetris of taking the ingredients of a business and figure out how to put them together to drive the business forward. I love the work we do because quite simply, it works. We’re able to drive real growth for businesses with our strategies and we do it with the smartest group of people with whom I’ve ever had the pleasure of working.
Pricing:
- Our engagements are priced based on a weekly consulting engagement rate, dependent on the teams and workstreams needed. Each engagement is custom to the particular needs of the client, but we pride ourselves on not taking fights we can’t win (meaning, we do the work in advance to make sure that we can at least drive a 3x return on the investment in our project fees before we kick off the value creation project).
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.auxinsights.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kaseygrelle/
