ma-and-pa
Americanadjective
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Lucky Strike: Not exactly the ma-and-pa bowling alley of your youth.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 14, 2019
Once she graduated, Wyman ran her long-shot City Hall campaign out of her parents' ma-and-pa drugstore at 9th and Western.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 13, 2016
The show had been setting up Kansas City as the Walmart to the Gerhardts’ ma-and-pa operation all season, but it seems unlikely that it’s actually run out of an office building like Walmart.
From New York Times ● Dec. 14, 2015
He didn't have figures for how many brokerages have closed in recent years, though he said the smaller ma-and-pa operations often have been the ones that "learned some tough lessons."
From Chicago Tribune ● Jul. 11, 2011
From a tangle of 3,000 mostly ma-and-pa firms, three ambulance leaders, all based in the West, have emerged to seize 25% of the national market.
From Time Magazine Archive
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
