Evanston Partners

Managing Members William V. Glastris, Jr. and Jeffrey D. Ellis lead the firm’s investment activity. Glastris has operated in the lower-middle market since 1983, including thirteen years as a Founding Principal of Prospect Partners, where he helped deploy $470 million across three funds. Ellis combines principal investing experience from High Street Capital with leveraged finance and M&A expertise from Wells Fargo and Macquarie Capital.

The firm relies on the extensive personal networks of its principals, built over decades in the Chicago lower-middle market. William Glastris spent his early career at Golder, Thoma & Cressey and LaSalle Capital Group, and Jeffrey Ellis developed relationships through High Street Capital and Wells Fargo's Leveraged Finance Group. The firm's advisor network — including M&A lawyer Sy Peck and corporate development consultant Joseph Feldman — further expands its origination reach.

The firm invests principal and advisor capital directly into each portfolio company and does not promote a formal co-investment program for outside limited partners. Its public materials position the firm as a direct equity partner to management teams rather than a fund-of-funds or club-deal syndicate serving external allocators.

Managing Member Jeffrey Ellis serves as CFO and a director of portfolio company Auto Driveaway Transport Logistics, where he has executed over thirty add-on acquisitions of formerly franchised offices. This deep operational embed illustrates a hands-on, operator-partner approach rather than a purely financial-oversight board role.