For business owners
Four Levers. One Plan You’re Already Paying For.
You already fund a retirement plan every year. Used deliberately, that same spend can lower turnover, cut what you hand the IRS, tighten how the business runs, and build a retirement outside the business. Four levers, one system.
Built by Scott Pooch, 20+ years working with business owners. 160 retirement plans managed.
Real Impact, By The Numbers
Illustrative ranges. Not guarantees. Actual results depend on your specific situation and require CPA validation.
You're Already Paying. What Are You Getting Back?
You already have money going into the plan. 401Grow looks at what that spend is doing for the business and reallo(k)ates it toward different outcomes. Most, sometimes all, of the funding comes from what you already spend. Some businesses need additional funding.
Lower Turnover
The 21-Day Challenge and the 12-month Employee Roadmap, designed to reduce the 6-9 month replacement cost per lost employee.
Tax Optimization
Strategic plan design built to maximize owner deductions and deferrals throughout the year.
Operational Excellence
Defined roles, documented systems, and clean data, the operational backbone that makes your business scalable, sellable, and AI-ready.
Transferable Value
Build to exit, even if you never sell. The goal is a business you can step away from and retirement wealth that is not tied entirely to it.
How 401Grow Is Different
Traditional 401(k) providers focus on compliance and investment selection. We focus on business outcomes.
Traditional Approach
- Product-first: pick our recordkeeper
- AUM-based fees (conflict of interest)
- Focus on compliance + investments
- One lever: retirement savings
- Generic plan design templates
401Grow Four-Lever System
- Strategy-first: keep your recordkeeper, upgrade your strategy
- Flat transparent fee: $3,997 + $50/participant
- Focus on tax optimization, turnover reduction, transferable value
- Four coordinated levers: lower turnover, tax optimization, operational excellence, transferable value
- Custom design aligned to your specific business goals
- Funded largely by reallocating existing plan spend. Some businesses need additional funding.
Bottom line: 401Grow uses the retirement plan conversation to connect existing spend to four business priorities: turnover, taxes, operations, and transferable value.
The Math Is Simple
The reason this works for most owners: you're funding it with money you already spend.
Recordkeeper, TPA, and investment-related fees you're paying today, including any asset-based charges that rise as plan assets grow.
That spend is reallo(k)ated into the Four-Lever System, a flat $3,997 + $50/EE, with no asset-based 401Grow fee.
Existing plan spend, redirected, can cover most and sometimes all of the cost. Some businesses need additional funding.
For many owners, Year 1 pays for itself through fee renegotiation and Reallo(k)ate savings alone, before the turnover, tax, and transferable-value upside is counted. Illustrative; results vary and require CPA validation.
Three Things You Can Count On
And one thing we don't do.
Simple to set up
Most onboarding is paperwork review. We do the heavy lifting, document collection, vendor coordination, stakeholder mapping. You don't become the project manager.
Easy to operate
Quarterly meetings. Written deliverables. We coordinate with your recordkeeper, TPA, 3(38), and CPA. You stay focused on your business.
Surprisingly affordable
$3,997 + $50/EE per year. Reallo(k)ating existing plan spend can cover most, and sometimes all, of the cost. Some businesses need additional funding.
Year 1: We Don't Replace What's Working
Our default Year 1 approach is to keep your existing recordkeeper, TPA, and 3(38) in place, and negotiate better pricing with the incumbents before recommending any vendor change.
Why? Vendor changes create real disruption for you and your employees. The benefits of switching are often less than the benefits of negotiating with incumbents. We only recommend a Year 1 vendor change when there's a documented fiduciary issue or a cost problem too large for renegotiation to resolve.
Year 2 is when bigger structural moves get considered, if Year 1 data justify them.
Low disruption. Real results. Year 1 stability.
The Four Levers
Four business levers drive owner value. Most 401(k) consultants only touch one. The Four-Lever System coordinates all four, and your retirement plan is one tool inside the system, not the system itself.
Lower Turnover
The 21-Day Challenge and the Employee Roadmap drive most retention gains; strategic plan design plays a smaller supporting role.
Tax Optimization
Strategic plan design can improve the fit between owner tax goals and retirement contributions. How plan expenses are paid can also affect deductible business expenses.
Operational Excellence
Clearly defined roles. Documented systems. Clean data. An operational backbone that supports scale, transferability, and practical AI use. Plan design is only a supporting piece.
Try the free SOP Starter →Transferable Value
Build to exit, even if you never sell. Transferable value isn't just a business metric, it's your personal wealth. A transferable business gives you options and freedom, whether you stay or go.
How It Works
Simple, structured, no surprises.
Run a Free Tool
Start with Who Pays the Plan's Fees. Two minutes, no login, and the result stays on the page.
Book a Discovery Call
Bring the tool's output. The conversation starts where it matters, not from scratch.
Four Levers Review
Comprehensive positioning analysis across lower turnover, tax optimization, operational excellence, and transferable value.
Ongoing Consulting
$3,997/yr + $50/EE. Most, sometimes all, of the funding comes from what you already spend. Some businesses need additional funding. Keep your recordkeeper. Investment management stays with outside 3(38) fiduciaries.
Who This Is For
Business Owners (10-99 EE)
Even a best-in-class 401(k) is not automatically a business-building asset. The Four-Lever system turns it into a business and wealth-building tool for owners.
See where you stand →CPAs
Add strategic plan consulting to owner tax strategy conversations without disrupting your core tax relationship. Referral compensation or preferred client pricing is available where permitted.
Explore the partner program →Fractional CFOs
Reallocate retirement-plan spend toward the highest and best use. The Four-Lever framework helps you improve margin, transferable value, and owner outcomes.
Explore the partner program →Financial Advisors & Wealth Managers
Partner with 401Grow to handle specialized plan strategy while you protect the client relationship and benefit from stronger long-term asset growth.
Explore the partner program →TPAs
You already own plan design and compliance. We add the Four-Lever conversation that moves sponsors past a compliance checkbox to the outcomes owners actually care about. We work alongside you, never around you.
Explore the partner program →HR, benefits, or finance leader? There's a dedicated path for you →
See Where You Stand. Free Tools, No Login.
Three tools, in order. Each one is about the plan you already pay for. About 10 minutes for all three.
Reallo(k)ate Calculator
See what your current plan spend could be doing for the business, and how far reallo(k)ating it could go toward the cost.
Run ItFree Plan Snapshot
A one-page read of your own plan, built from its public Form 5500 filing. What it shows, and the two or three things worth a closer look.
Ask for ItWho Pays the Plan's Fees?
What an asset-based fee takes out of participant accounts each year, who bears it, and what changes if the company pays it by check.
See It