Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(US) describing something (occas. someone) expensive or requiring a considerable financial outlay.

1960, 1975		Wentworth & Flexner DAS.
1971		Hearings Joint Economic Cttee (US Congress) 490: Then the big ticket items you would define as being automobiles and appliances, things like that?
1980		G. Liddy Will 201: [W]e went to work quickly on a new plan calling for the expenditure of no more than $500,000. We cut the big-ticket items first.
1997		Simon & Burns Corner (1998) 35: It was little things at first, food and small appliances, but eventually the big-ticket stuff too.
2000		Observer Mag. 12 Mar. 69: I have visited a series of big-ticket openings in London.
2003		J. Lethem Fortress of Solitude 172: They also shift big-ticket items like registers and rubber matting.
2020		D. Winslow ‘Sunset’ in Broken 191: ‘A big-ticket jumper’ [...] ‘Does he have a name?’.
2023		(con. 1962) J. Ellroy Enchanters 75: Big-ticket sedans disgorged westside swells.