Meaning
Something (or, more rarely, someone) that can be won, obtained, or accomplished with little effort, such as the easiest customers to sign or the most obvious problems to fix. Usually plural in business usage: the quickest wins available before harder work begins. Neutral business register, though increasingly felt to be a cliché. Business-neutral register; connotation of easy wins, sometimes dismissive of those wins' value. Regional use: General English.
Origin
The literal agricultural image of picking the fruit that hangs lowest is centuries old, but Merriam-Webster dates the first known figurative use to 1909, and the Oxford English Dictionary also places the noun in the 1900s. The idiom stayed relatively rare until it took hold in business and sales jargon: The Idioms cites a 1968 Guardian appearance in print, and Language Log traces its corporate currency to early-1980s US business journalism, quoting a 1981 Fortune article describing Intel starting with 'the low-hanging fruit' of routine departments. It became a boardroom staple in the 1990s-2000s. Recent claims that the phrase carries offensive connotations circulate online but are disputed; the documented etymology is purely agricultural.
Research Sources
References used to check this entry’s meaning, history, or documented forms.
Variants
- grab the low-hanging fruit
- lowest-hanging fruit
Usage Examples
- Fixing the broken checkout page is low-hanging fruit compared to the redesign.
- The team spent the first month picking the low-hanging fruit in the backlog.
- These suburbs are low-hanging fruit for the new delivery service.