lock-in

lock-innoun

• 1

  A sleepover party, usually held in a public place such as a church or school, in which the participants are not allowed to leave until the next morning.

  • The youth group will have their annual lock-in this weekend.
• 2

  An illegal but widely-tolerated invitation-only gathering in a pub, after the end of licensing hours, to allow regular customers the opportunity to enjoy further drinking time.

  • He was a lunatic drunk and started sing songs that lasted into the early hours of the morning and resulted in many weekend lock-ins in the village pub.
• 3

  businessA situation in which a business has adopted a certain standard or product from a specific manufacturer and integrated it into their process, thus making it very costly to change to a different standard or supplier.

  • vendor lock-in
• 4

  businessfinanceThe situation where an investor cannot trade without incurring an undesirable penalty such as taxation.