Cadre AI is one of the best-run AI consulting firms in the market. They have a proven framework, strong case studies, and an OpenAI Service Partner badge. They also will not take your call if your business does under $30M in revenue. Ironback was built specifically for the 25 to 50 person specialty trade company doing $2M to $15M — the market that Cadre and every firm like them have deliberately left behind.
Specialty trade businesses doing $1M–$20M where the owner answers the phone, manages the crews, and cannot justify a six-figure annual consulting engagement. You need one reliable person who knows your industry, not a team of enterprise strategists.
PE-backed companies doing $30M+ revenue that need multi-department AI transformation with a structured framework, a dedicated team, and the credibility signals that a PE buyer or board requires.
Third-party figures are planning estimates based on public pricing and market benchmarks, not vendor quotes. Verify current pricing and scope before making a purchasing decision.
Flat $8,000/month retainer, 3-month minimum, month-to-month after. Designed for trade businesses doing $1M–$20M revenue with 5–50 employees.
Cadre AI runs approximately $8,000–$17,000/month retainers (estimated from $3M–$6M Year 1 revenue across roughly 30 clients). Free AI Maturity Index assessment as lead gen for enterprise prospects. Targeting $12M–$15M ARR in Year 2.
Both providers require a current scope and quote for a fair comparison. Ironback is $96,000 for twelve months at the current flat retainer and is positioned for service businesses in the $1M–$20M revenue range.
It matters if you need custom large language models or enterprise-grade AI infrastructure. Most trade businesses do not. You need calls answered, estimates sent, follow-ups automated, and compliance docs filed. Those are operational problems, not infrastructure problems. An OpenAI badge does not make dispatch scheduling work better for a 30-person fire sprinkler company.
Cadre publishes strong numbers because they work with $30M+ companies where the math is big by default. Ironback publishes trade-specific numbers: recovering 2 missed jobs per month for a mobile hydraulics shop is $27,500 in annual revenue. For a biohazard company, getting insurance claim approval from 60% to 91% changes the entire P&L. The numbers are smaller in absolute terms and more relevant to your actual business.
Maybe. If you hit $30M and need to restructure AI across multiple departments with hundreds of employees, an enterprise firm like Cadre makes sense. But most trade businesses that grow from $5M to $15M do not suddenly need enterprise consulting. They need the same operational specialist doing more. Ironback scales with you — more automations, more categories, more sophistication — without requiring you to switch to a consultant who has never met a boiler contractor.
These specialty trades see the biggest impact from choosing the right AI operations approach.
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Ironback is a dedicated AI operations partner for service businesses doing $1M–$20M. Flat $8,000/month, 3-month minimum. We find where AI unlocks value, build it, and run it. Start with the free Operations Scorecard. It recommends the first workflow to investigate in about a minute.
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