Accounting & Fractional CFO for Product and Ecommerce Brands

What makes product-company accounting different

Landed cost, not invoice cost

The factory invoice is only part of what a product costs. Freight, duty, tariffs, inbound logistics and packaging all belong in cost of goods sold. When they sit in overhead instead, every product looks more profitable than it is — and pricing decisions get made on the wrong number.

Margin by product and by channel

A D2C order and a wholesale order for the same product have completely different economics: price, payment processing and marketplace fees, advertising, fulfillment, returns and payment terms. We build reporting that shows profitability by product and by channel, net of those costs, so you can see which part of your growth is worth having.

Inventory is where the cash goes

In a product business, growth consumes cash. You pay for inventory long before customers pay you, so doubling revenue roughly doubles the inventory you have to finance. We model the full cash cycle — deposits, production, transit, warehousing, sell-through and collection — so inventory commitments are sized against a forecast instead of optimism.

Two businesses, one ledger

B2B and D2C differ in margin structure, acquisition cost, working capital cycle and the multiple a buyer would pay. Reporting them as one business hides both. When it makes sense, we help separate them into distinct segments or even separate entities with standalone financials.

Proof: Tessaline Devices

Tessaline Devices, a consumer electronics company in Dallas–Fort Worth selling both to businesses and direct to consumers, worked with Accounovation for five years. Over that time revenue grew several-fold without drawing on its line of credit. We replaced an oversized SAP implementation with Zoho, built product- and channel-level profitability, funded inventory growth through negotiated customer prepayments, separated the B2B and D2C lines into two entities, carried the company to audited financials and handed the function to an in-house finance team. Read the full Tessaline Devices case study.

Halden Acoustics shows the import side of the same problem: prepaid inventory, ocean freight that belongs in product cost, and a long operating cash cycle that has to be forecast months ahead.

Services for product companies

The work draws on our bookkeeping, controller services, fractional CFO and cash flow management services.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do you work with ecommerce-only brands?

Our sweet spot is companies with real inventory and product-cost complexity — manufacturers, importers and product brands — whether they sell online, wholesale or both. If you design, make or source physical products, we're likely a fit.

Can you account for Shopify and Amazon sales?

Yes. We record marketplace and storefront sales, fees, refunds and payouts so that revenue, fees and cost of goods sold land in the right places, and we report profitability by channel.

How do you calculate landed cost?

Landed cost adds freight, duty, tariffs, insurance, inbound handling and similar costs to the supplier price, then allocates them across the units received. That figure — not the invoice price — becomes your inventory value and cost of goods sold.

Why is my product business profitable but short of cash?

Because inventory is paid for months before it's sold, so growth ties up more and more cash in stock. A profitable company can still be unable to fund its next purchase order. A cash forecast built around the inventory cycle shows the gap before it becomes a crisis, and options like customer deposits, supplier terms and faster inventory turns can close it without debt.

Should B2B and D2C be separate entities?

Separate reporting is essential. Separate legal entities make sense when you may raise capital for, sell or spin off one line, or when the operations have genuinely diverged. Separating early is far cheaper than separating under deal pressure.

Do you handle sales tax filing?

Accounovation is not a CPA firm and doesn't file tax returns. We keep the records and reports your sales tax provider or CPA needs and help you understand where you may have nexus.