Tempus Partners

Tempus Partners

Tempus Partners was co-founded by Managing Partners Kyle White and Geoffrey Champlin to invest in profitable small businesses across the consumer products and consumer manufacturing spaces. White's background spans Morgan Stanley investment banking, startup founding, and M&A leadership at Time Inc., while Champlin previously served as Chief Revenue Officer at Catch Co, the largest consumer startup in the fishing industry. The firm operates out of Dallas. The strategy centers on full buyouts and growth partnerships for US-based companies generating $10M–$100M in revenue and $1.5M–$10M in EBITDA. Tempus targets majority control — over 80% ownership in buyouts where existing owners retire after a transition, and over 51% in growth deals where leadership remains involved. The portfolio concentrates on consumer products and manufacturing. Confirmed positions include Contender Bicycles, a high-end cycling retailer, and Dawson-Forté Cashmere, the parent company of direct-to-consumer cashmere brands KINROSS and &Isla Cashmere. Geographic focus is exclusively the United States. Tempus deploys an operator-heavy model: Operating Partner Josh Slawkin brings a decade of experience scaling consumer brands in outdoor and recreation, and the firm's website frames its team as directly taking operational control post-close. The most recent disclosed transaction was the acquisition of a majority stake in Dawson-Forté Cashmere, adding a vertically integrated cashmere knitwear business to a portfolio that already included the retail cycling platform Contender Bicycles. Team size and aggregate deployment figures are not publicly disclosed. What distinguishes Tempus is its intentional deployment into an EBITDA range that sits between institutional private equity minimums and individual search-fund maximums. The firm's structure as a permanent-capital operator — not a blind-pool fund — lets it hold businesses indefinitely and apply in-house ecommerce, digital marketing, and operations talent directly to portfolio companies, a configuration rare among US lower-middle-market consumer investors.