Plan B

Posted by James Briggs on July 31, 2003

In Reply to: Plan B posted by K on July 31, 2003

: Does anyone know where the expression "Plan B" comes from?

: Thanks
: K

It implies a fall-back arrangement when a first scheme to deal with a problem/situation fails. The analogy here is one where there are two supposed plans to deal with the problem - plan A and plan B. If plan A fails, then the saying goes 'well- it's back to plan B'. Often there is no real plan B and resort to this mythical plan means that the planner has no real idea of what to do! (sometimes, there's no plan A either, but that is really bad planning!!)
I don't know where the phrase/idea was first used, but I bet some of the other contributors do.