Xavier Staggs
Founder, Staggs Capital Partners | M&A Advisor | Columbus, Ohio
My career has been built on one discipline: helping business owners make clear, strategic decisions about their most valuable asset. Over more than two decades in Ohio and across the broader region, I have advised founders, led acquisitions, and built companies from concept to exit.
About Me
I am the founder and principal of Staggs Capital Partners, an advisory firm based in Columbus, Ohio, focused on mergers and acquisitions, strategic exit planning, and fractional C-suite services for privately held businesses. My clients are owners who have spent decades building something and want to maximize enterprise value at exit.
I came to this work through operations, not theory. Before founding Staggs Capital, I was an operator. I have started companies, run them through difficult periods, and taken them through successful exits. That experience is the foundation of everything I do for clients today.
My background includes a law degree and legal training, which sharpens how I read deals, assess risk, and structure transactions. I am not a practicing attorney — I am a dealmaker and entrepreneur. My value to clients is judgment and execution, not legal counsel. For anyone who wants the full context on my career transition out of law, I address that directly toward the end of this page.
Selected Work
Eight-Figure Healthcare Exit — Wound Care Sector (January 2025)
Staggs Capital advised on the strategic exit of a wound care business, completing a transaction valued in the eight figures. The engagement involved multi-party structuring, extended diligence coordination, and positioning the seller for maximum value in a specialized market segment.
Fuel Counter — Restaurant Chain Founding and Exit, West Virginia
I co-founded Fuel Counter, a health-focused fast casual restaurant concept in West Virginia & Ohio, building the brand across multiple locations before managing the business through a successful sale. The process reflected the same principles I bring to every advisory client: build with operational integrity, and position the exit from day one.
CardiOptix — Strategic Advisory, Active Fundraising Stage
I serve as a strategic advisor to CardiOptix, a healthcare technology company currently in active fundraising. My role centers on investor positioning, fundraising strategy, and deal structure. This engagement reflects a consistent focus across my career: healthcare and technology businesses where strategic advice at the growth stage determines long-term outcomes.
“Most owners only sell their business once. The preparation you put in before that moment determines everything that comes after it.”
What Staggs Capital Does
Staggs Capital Partners works with privately held companies nationwide. Our core services are M&A advisory, strategic exit planning, and fractional C-suite engagements for companies that need experienced leadership without a full-time executive commitment.
The businesses we work with typically generate between $5 million and $100 million in revenue and are owned by founders or families who built them without institutional backing. Many are approaching a transition — generational, financial, or strategic — and need a partner who has been through that process themselves.
We operate from Columbus, Ohio, with an active presence in Huntington, West Virginia and the broader Appalachian business corridor. The region is underserved by traditional investment banks, and that gap is where Staggs Capital has built its practice.
Credentials & Current Roles
I hold a Certified M&A Advisor designation and a FINRA Series 63 license. My Juris Doctor is from The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law (2006), with a concentration in business law, mergers and acquisitions, tax, and securities.
In addition to Staggs Capital, I currently serve in fractional executive and advisory roles across several companies, including as CEO of a cardiac medical device company in active growth and as a strategic advisor to a regional health system. I maintain 50+ active buy-side and sell-side M&A client engagements nationwide.
My community involvement includes serving on the Board of Advisors for Owners in Honor, as Treasurer and Director of Country Roads Angel Network, as Director of Hospice of Huntington, and as Treasurer and Director of the West Virginia Hospitality & Travel Association (WVHTA).
On My Career Transition and Legal Background
My legal background is part of my professional history, and I address it directly here for anyone who wants the full picture.
In 2023, I exited my legal practice entirely. I transferred my client book to partners at a national firm and made a commitment not to compete. My full focus had shifted to preparing Fuel Counter for exit and building Staggs Capital and the other businesses I was advising and leading. I was not practicing law.
Thereafter, I was navigating an administrative dispute with former partners. Because of my exit and commitment, I was already constrained from practicing. Filing the voluntary petition to annul my license was the most practical and cost-efficient way to resolve the matter and move forward. It was a business decision made in that context — not a response to any ethical or disciplinary finding.
The matter did not stem from a client or a client’s concern about financial or any other type of harm. I continue to work with many of my former legal clients in other capacities to this day. The situation was an internal disagreement, resolved administratively. I am not prohibited from applying to resume my practice, and I have not dismissed that possibility.
For anyone conducting diligence: I am willing to have a direct conversation. I have shared context openly with partners and investors who asked. It has not changed what I deliver. The record of my work — the deals closed, the companies built, the owners and communities served — is the most accurate measure of who I am.
To connect about advisory services:
xstaggs@staggscapital.com | staggscapital.com | xavierstaggs.com