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Make the first offer bold, but not so bold it angers buyers

Oct 10
3 min read

Updated: Oct 11

Pierre-Joseph Redouté's watercolor plate of the rose Rosa gallica regalis
Rosa gallica regalis, from Pierre-Joseph Redouté's Les Roses (1817–1824). A rose is beautiful, but its thorns can cut. A bold first offer is the same.

The first number on the table often sets the deal, but it can also end the deal.


The study. A team of 15 negotiation researchers combined 374 results from 90 studies with 16,334 people. Then they ran 2 new experiments with 2,121 people.


The finding. The size of the first offer had a strong link to the final price (correlation r = 0.62). But bold first offers also caused more failed deals and made the other side less satisfied.

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