23.5Strategies
All Selected Work

Selected Work

JV Growth Operating Model

Major U.S. Refiner-Marketer + Best-in-Class Convenience Retail Operator (Anonymized)

A retail-fuel JV growth blueprint translated into a run-ready commercial operating system — consignment economics, automated tank dispatch, market-responsive pricing, and working-capital discipline built to outperform under volatility.

JV Growth Operating Model — cover

Executive Summary

A major U.S. refiner-marketer partnered with a best-in-class convenience retail operator to grow a regional retail fuel network in a structurally challenging metro market — fragmentation, a long tail of low-quality sites, accelerating consolidation, and aggressive high-volume entrants like warehouse clubs and large-format resellers compressing returns from every direction.

The work shaped an integrated growth plan that connected capital structure, store rollout, fuel supply, price optimization, and working-capital discipline into a single decision-ready roadmap — designed so the partner could focus on store execution and customer experience while the refiner-marketer optimized replenishment, pricing, and inventory as one integrated commercial system.

Mandate

Defend and expand share in a fragmented metro market against high-throughput, low-cost competitors, by designing a JV operating model — consignment economics, supply readiness, and pricing discipline — that uses balance-sheet advantage to finance site growth at a lower cost of capital than standalone retail economics would support.

What We Delivered

  • Quantified value-creation thesis for the JV — where returns would be generated (store operations, supply advantage, disciplined pricing) and what had to be true for success.
  • Multi-year, site-level rollout plan (~20 new-to-industry builds) translated into actionable supply requirements, including component-level volumes (ethanol, biodiesel) and truckload/terminal impacts.
  • Retail pricing operating system — competitor-set strategy, price-optimization approach, governance guardrails, and an exception process to balance margin against share.
  • Working-capital and inventory playbook aligned to the consignment model — min/max targets, reorder points, inventory turns, and cash discipline.
  • Executive-ready decision materials — assumptions, scenarios, risks, and an operating cadence across Marketing, Supply, Finance, and the JV partner.

Why It Mattered

  • Enabled leadership to commit capital and pursue growth with line-of-sight to supply readiness, logistics capacity, and cash impacts — not as separate plans, but as one integrated view.
  • Connected the upstream advantage (refining, transport, distribution) to retail execution through a practical pricing and inventory system the partner could actually run.
  • Improved decision quality by turning a growth story into an integrated plan with measurable milestones, risks, and named accountability.

Approach

Workstreams.

Market Structure & Competitive Physics

Segmentation of the retail landscape, entrant analysis, and the implications of high-volume resellers for pricing and site economics — including what to defend, what to concede, and where the JV had a structural right-to-win.

JV Model & Capital Allocation

Consignment economics, funding approach leveraging the refiner-marketer's lower cost of capital, and the return drivers required for the model to scale across the build program.

Growth Roadmap & Volume Forecast

Phased build program and volume trajectory with sensitivity cases — stress-tested against partner cadence, supply readiness, and downside scenarios before capital commitment.

Supply, Components & Logistics Readiness

Translation of forecast volumes into base product and renewable component requirements, with explicit visibility to truckload, terminal, and scheduling impacts so ramp-up did not surprise the supply chain.

Pricing System & Governance

Rules-based (and ultimately algorithmic) price optimization against local competitor sets and the live cost stack, inside governance guardrails — with an exception process and reporting cadence that protects both margin and share.

Working Capital & Inventory Discipline

Inventory targets, automated tank dispatch (ATD) telemetry plus reorder points, replenishment logic, and cash controls — designed so turns improved, run-outs and overfills declined, and cash didn't sit in fuel.

Capabilities Demonstrated

  • — Cross-functional assessments connecting strategy to execution across Marketing, Supply, Finance, Scheduling, and the JV partner
  • — Growth strategy and capital allocation in mature and contested markets — including partnership design and financing logic
  • — Pricing and revenue management — competitor strategy, optimization architecture, governance and exception process
  • — End-to-end supply chain thinking — refining, terminal, logistics, blending components, inventory, and working capital as one cost stack

Focus Areas

JV / partnership growth strategyConsignment economics & incentive alignmentPricing & revenue managementDispatch & replenishment (ATD)Forecast-to-supply translationWorking capital & inventory disciplineCross-partner governance & cadence

Note ·This case study is an anonymized work product. All identifying details — client name, people, sites, counterparties, systems, and non-public metrics — have been removed or generalized; any references to quantities are directional or expressed as ranges. The intent is to show method and judgment, not to disclose proprietary information.

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