Find more time.
Automate repetitive work, remove dead handoffs, and return attention to the people who create value.
A commercial innovation company
Find more
acreage.
Back Forty uncovers overlooked value, turns it into a working system, and builds the path from idea to enduring business.
43.0069° N · 88.2315° WScroll beyond the obvious
The premise
Most companies work the obvious acres.
We go where the opportunity is still hidden.
The back forty is the territory beyond the immediate view: underused, underestimated, and full of potential. That is where we work.
We combine commercial intelligence, product strategy, design, AI, and venture building to turn neglected possibilities into operating advantage.
What we unlock
Six forms of
commercial acreage.
The work changes by company. The result should not: more capacity, stronger economics, better decisions, and something real operating in the world.
Find more cash flow.
Expose margin leaks, pricing power, revenue whitespace, and new ways to monetize existing capability.
Find more efficiency.
Redesign workflows, decisions, data, and tools around what creates measurable commercial value.
Find better customer experiences.
Translate customer friction and unmet jobs into products and experiences people can feel.
Find more differentiation.
Build a sharper market position, a harder-to-copy system, and a reason to choose you that survives comparison.
Find more acreage.
Discover adjacent markets, neglected users, underused assets, and strange ideas that can become the next business.
The operating method
From signal
to system.
Back Forty does not stop at a recommendation. The work moves toward a product, workflow, intelligence layer, experience, or venture that actually functions.
Find the signal.
Research customers, markets, economics, value chains, operations, and data until the hidden constraint or opening becomes visible.
Frame the opportunity.
Turn noise into a commercial thesis: who it serves, why it matters, where value accumulates, and what must be true.
Build the system.
Create the product, workflow, automation, brand, decision architecture, or venture required to capture the value.
Prove the acreage.
Launch, instrument, learn, and decide where to cultivate, scale, partner, or walk away.
Selected fields
Built beyond
the fence.
A portfolio of work spanning commercial intelligence, autonomous systems, digital products, and new venture creation.
Field ASignal
Commercial intelligence
Find the right customers, markets, signals, and opportunities before they become obvious.
Field BSystem
Autonomous systems
Agents, workflows, and decision infrastructure that move work forward without constant intervention.
Field CProduct
Digital products
Purpose-built software and new experiences shaped around a specific job worth solving.
Field DVenture
Venture creation
From early thesis to brand, prototype, economics, launch, and operating company.
About the operator
Justin
Fagan.
Marketing×Product×Innovation
I help industrial leaders turn complexity into clearer choices, stronger portfolios, and measurable growth.
My work has moved from the U.S. Army to global mining, construction, commercial vehicle, and truck-parts businesses—always at the point where markets, products, people, and action have to connect.
Operator / Builder / Problem solver
A career + operating constellationEleven systems / one through-line
- U.S. Army
- P&H Mining
- Joy Global Mining
- Komatsu Mining
- SANY
- Putzmeister
- GVW Holdings
- Autocar Parts
- JIT Truck Parts
- GVW Parts
- Match Made Parts
Drag, swipe, or use the arrows to see the full constellation.
The through-line
I make the complicated commercially legible.
I am a marketing and product leader who likes hard categories, imperfect information, and the space between what a business knows and what it is ready to do. I use customer truth, portfolio logic, pricing, product storytelling, and increasingly agentic systems to help teams find the next good move.
The common thread is not an industry. It is the work: understand the real job, find the leverage, make the choice visible, and build enough momentum for the organization to act on it.
15+Years across technical B2B, product, marketing, pricing, and innovation
60+Product categories shaped across complex commercial portfolios
100K+SKUs navigated through brand, portfolio, channel, and customer systems
1Standard: build something useful enough to operate in the real world
The best opportunities rarely arrive looking like opportunities.
Open the gate
What is sitting in
your back forty?
Bring the neglected idea, stubborn commercial problem, underused data, emerging technology, or market nobody has properly framed yet.
justin@backforty.io↗