drive a hard bargain
drive a hard bargain
To be a skillful and unyielding negotiator or dealmaker. Sal is known to drive a hard bargain, so I doubt you'll get that car for the price you want.
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms. © 2015 Farlex, Inc, all rights reserved.
drive a hard bargain
to work hard to negotiate prices or agreements in one's own favor. All right, sir, you drive a hard bargain. I'll sell you this car for $12,450. You drive a hard bargain, Jane, but I'll sign the contract.
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs. © 2002 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
drive a hard bargain
Be severe in negotiating a transaction, make an agreement to one's advantage. For example, It's more than I planned to pay, but you drive a hard bargain. This expression, first recorded in 1836, uses the verb drive in the sense of "forcefully carry through."
The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. Copyright © 2003, 1997 by The Christine Ammer 1992 Trust. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
drive a hard ˈbargain
make sure that you always gain an advantage in business deals, etc: I wouldn’t try to do business with Jack; he’s got the reputation of driving a hard bargain.Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017
drive a hard bargain, to
To exact as much as possible from a transaction. Drive in this expression is in the sense of vigorously carrying through something. It was so used as long ago as the sixteenth century, when Sir Philip Sidney wrote, “There never was a better bargain driven” (My True Love Hath My Heart, 1583). Hard, in the sense of “unyielding,” is coupled with bargain even earlier, in a translation from the Greek of Suidas (Lexicon, ca. a.d. 950): “A hard bargainer never gets good meat.”
The Dictionary of Clichés by Christine Ammer Copyright © 2013 by Christine Ammer