Meaco
Why Meaco worked with a fractional CFO
Meaco (U.K.) Limited is one of the UK's best-known names in dehumidifiers and air treatment, with over 30 years of experience, a range that exports to more than 20 countries, and a shelf full of Which? and Good Housekeeping awards to show for it. But even a business winning industry recognition on the product side can outgrow its finance function - and that's exactly the point Meaco reached in spring 2024.
Up to that point, quarterly reviews and auditing had been handled by an external accountancy agency. As the business considered its next stage of growth, it became clear that model had a ceiling. In Meaco's own words, “We needed a CFO instead of just using an external agency for management accounts and accountants for quarterly reviews and auditing.”
Rather than committing straight to a full-time hire, Meaco chose a lower-risk route in first: bringing in a fractional CFO to prove the value before making a permanent appointment. As the team put it, “We went down the route of testing the waters with a temporary CFO to help us improve our systems and gain a better understanding of what we would need in the medium term.”
It's a strategy we see work time and again for growing SMEs - fractional support de-risks the decision, builds the business case, and means the systems and processes are already in shape by the time a permanent CFO walks through the door.
The process of working with The Finance People
Meaco didn't take the decision lightly. The team reached out to several fractional CFO providers and interviewed multiple candidates before making their choice - and the calibre of the market wasn't in question.
As Meaco explained, “Most of the CFOs were more than capable of dealing with a company of our size, but Diane stood out for us because we felt that she was a good personality fit for Meaco and that she had the skillset to help to develop and lead the existing team members.”
A fractional CFO isn't just a set of technical skills on a spreadsheet - they need to slot into an existing team, earn trust quickly, and lead people who were there long before they arrived and will be there long after they leave. Diane Medley Brown did exactly that, and the impact was felt well beyond the finance function. In Meaco's words: “All team members, not just myself, feel that we made the right choice, and Diane has been a credit to The Finance People and herself.”
Chris Michael, Founder and Managing Director at Meaco
“We went down the route of testing the waters with a temporary CFO to help us improve our systems and gain a better understanding of what we would need in the medium term. Most of the CFOs were more than capable of dealing with a company of our size, but Diane stood out for us because we felt that she was a good personality fit for Meaco and that she had the skillset to help to develop and lead the existing team members. All team members, not just myself, feel that we made the right choice, and Diane has been a credit to The Finance People and herself.”
The results
What started as a project to “test the waters” quickly became mission-critical. Since May 2024, Meaco has been through a period of strong, consolidated growth - and with it, a full due diligence and investment process that nobody had planned for when Diane was originally brought on board. As Meaco candidly put it, this was “not expected when Diane was hired, so was a movement of the goalposts by us” - and it piled pressure on an already demanding brief.
Diane rose to it and she kept the business investment-ready, managing an intense flow of data requests through due diligence, while continuing to build out Meaco's systems and develop its people in parallel. Two work streams that would challenge most finance leaders individually, run at the same time, throughout a period of real commercial pressure.
Having successfully steered Meaco through that investment process, the business decided the relationship was too valuable to end there. Rather than a clean handover, Meaco has brought in a full-time CFO to take on day-to-day management of the finance function — while keeping Diane in a fractional capacity to manage and drive the finance projects, a full-time CFO focused on daily operations simply doesn't have the bandwidth to lead. It's a model that keeps the best of both: consistent, full-time ownership of the day-to-day, and continued access to a fractional CFO who already knows the business inside out.
In the words of the business: "I know that I speak for all the staff when I say that we are very grateful for how she has made Meaco a better place."
Sound familiar? We'd love to hear from you. Contact our team to align with a fractional finance expert who can help take your business through its next stage of growth.
Key results at a glance
Retained as a fractional CFO to lead ongoing finance projects, working alongside a newly appointed full-time CFO who now owns day-to-day management
Took Meaco from external-agency accounting to a CFO-led finance function, without the cost or risk of an immediate full-time hire
Kept the business investment-ready throughout an unplanned due diligence and investment process, managing data requests while improving systems
