The true cost of sales leadership
What does a full-time Sales Director really cost your business?
Salary is only part of the cost.
Add employer National Insurance, pension, bonus, recruitment, car or allowance, technology, travel and other employment costs, and the true annual investment can be considerably higher.
Use the calculator to compare the real cost of employing a full-time Sales Director with an experienced Fractional Sales Director for the time your business actually needs. Nothing is hidden behind a form.
Use our assumptions or change every figure to reflect your business. The comparison updates instantly.
Employment cost assumptions updated for 2026/27
Employer National Insurance is applied at 15% above a £5,000 annual secondary threshold. Every other assumption is yours to change.
Indicative estimates for commercial comparison. Not tax, employment or financial advice.
The full-time Sales Director
Start with the salary. Everything else builds from it.
Change any figure and both models — full-time Sales Director and Fractional Sales Director — update immediately. Defaults are typical starting points, not fixed assumptions.
£9,880 additional annual costs included
The Fractional Sales Director
Then decide how many days of a Fractional Sales Director the business actually needs.
Your comparison
Full-time Sales Director
£132,430
Estimated true annual employer cost — £42,430 (47%) above the headline salary of £90,000.
Estimated first-year cash cost £139,180.
Fractional Sales Director
£69,000
Estimated annual investment, excluding VAT. 2 days a week across 46 working weeks — 92 days a year at £750 a day, an average of £5,750 a month.
Annual cost difference
£63,430 a year
Estimated cost difference — 48% lower than the employment model. It also buys fewer senior days, which is the trade-off.
Cost per senior day
A like-for-like day rate is a useful check, not a complete comparison: an employed director is available every working day, a fractional one is not.
Evans Sales Consultancy fees are quoted plus VAT. VAT treatment depends on your organisation's circumstances and is therefore excluded from the core cost comparison.
Which model fits?
Fractional leadership could be a strong fit
The business needs senior commercial direction, but not five days a week of it. That is the situation fractional leadership is designed for.
A defined number of senior days a month, with clear objectives, usually achieves more than an under-used full-time appointment.
Under these assumptions the fractional arrangement models at £69,000 a year against an estimated employer cost of £132,430, an estimated difference of £63,430 a year. It also buys a smaller quantity of senior time, which is the trade-off being made.
Answer the four optional questions for a conclusion based on your situation rather than the numbers alone.
Full-time cost, line by line
- Salary£90,000
- Bonus / commission£9,000
- Employer National Insurance15% above £5,000 (2026/27)£14,100
- Employer pension£2,700
- Recruitment (annualised)£13,500 spread over 2 years£6,750
- Technology£2,380
- Travel / expenses£6,000
- Training / development£1,500
- Estimated true annual employer cost£132,430
- Estimated first-year cash cost£139,180
The next step
Need the leadership, not the full-time cost base?
If your business needs experienced sales leadership but does not yet require a full-time Sales Director, Evans Sales Consultancy can provide fractional sales leadership at a level of involvement that fits the business.
A model is a model. A conversation about your pipeline, your team and what needs to change tells you whether the numbers above are the right ones.
Relevant Evans experience
What a Fractional Sales Director has delivered in practice.
Business Development
Q-railing
Opening up Scotland and the North of England for a major UK supplier
Read the case studySales Growth
Crucial Engineering
Taking a regional engineering business from £1.5m to £3.2m turnover
Read the case studySales Growth
D&I Home Improvements / D&I Window Solutions
From £2.2m to £4.6m turnover in 18 months
Read the case studyFurther reading
Sales leadership, cost and structure
Planning a new market? Explore practical thinking on market entry, international sales, distribution and building commercial traction in new territories.
Transparency
How we calculated this.
Full-time model
- Base salary and bonus are taken exactly as entered; the bonus is 10% of salary.
- Employer National Insurance is 15% of earnings above £5,000 a year (2026/27). A cash car allowance is included in those earnings; a company vehicle is not.
- Employer pension is applied to base salary at the percentage entered, plus any enhanced contribution.
- Recruitment is spread over 2 years in the annual figure and shown in full in the first-year cash cost.
- Vehicle, benefits, technology, travel, training and any additional overhead are added as entered.
- Available senior days assume 260 weekdays less 25 days annual leave, 8 public holidays and 5 days for absence, training and internal administration — 222 days.
Fractional model
- Annual days are 2 days a week across 46 working weeks, giving 92 days.
- Annual investment is days multiplied by the day rate of £750.
- Monthly average is the annual figure divided by twelve; engagements are usually invoiced as an agreed monthly fee.
- Professional fees are shown excluding VAT. Evans Sales Consultancy fees are quoted plus VAT. VAT treatment depends on your organisation's circumstances and is therefore excluded from the core cost comparison.
- There is no recruitment fee, notice period, bonus, pension, vehicle or employment risk in this model.
- Nothing here models the commercial result of either option — only what each costs.
Figures are indicative estimates for commercial comparison only. Actual employment costs vary according to remuneration structure, tax treatment, pension arrangements, benefits and individual circumstances. Confirm material employment or tax decisions with your accountant, payroll provider or professional adviser.
Cost questions
The salary is only part of it. On a £90,000 example base — the calculator's editable default, not a fixed assumption — with a 10% bonus, employer National Insurance, a 3% employer pension, a recruitment fee spread over two years and normal technology, travel and training costs, the estimated true annual employer cost is comfortably above £130,000. The calculator shows the figure for your own assumptions, line by line.
Fractional Sales Director engagements are priced on days rather than salary. The Evans Sales Consultancy standard day rate is £750 plus VAT, so two days a week across 46 working weeks models at £69,000 a year plus VAT, invoiced as an agreed monthly fee. One day a week, or a defined number of days a month, costs proportionately less.
Senior commercial leadership: strategy, pipeline, forecasting, sales management, standards and accountability, delivered inside your business on the days committed. There is no recruitment fee, bonus, pension, vehicle, notice period or long-term employment commitment.
When the role genuinely fills five days a week — usually a larger sales team, continuous management workload, or a business where commercial leadership is needed in the building every day. In that situation a fractional arrangement is often used to build the structure first and to define and recruit the permanent role properly.
No. Professional fees are compared excluding VAT, because VAT treatment depends on your organisation's circumstances. Evans Sales Consultancy fees are quoted plus VAT.
They are indicative estimates for commercial comparison, not tax, employment or financial advice. Employer National Insurance uses the standard 2026/27 rate and threshold; pension, recruitment, vehicle and benefit costs use whatever assumptions you enter. Confirm material decisions with your accountant or payroll provider.
If you want the wider picture of what a Fractional Sales Director does day to day, read the service page, or see how the work has played out for other businesses.
Talk it through before you decide.
A short conversation about your team, pipeline and workload will tell you far more than a model can. Tom reviews every enquiry personally.
Prefer to speak directly?