At the start of the year, Americans were spending around $5 for a dozen eggs. Prices hit record highs and Dollar Tree even stopped selling them due to the inflated cost.
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While prices have dropped throughout the year, winter demand and avian flu cases might make them shoot back up, according to a USA Today report.
Per the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, producer prices for chicken eggs were 64.3% higher this February than they were a dozen months earlier. The seven largest over-the-year increases since 1938 (when egg price data began being recorded) in egg prices occurred over a 10-month period from 2022 and 2023.
Data from this year showed that prices went down from around $5 in January to around just over $2 in July. Then they climbed slightly to $2.14 in November.
Over the past month, there have been 92 flocks with confirmed Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. So far this year, there have been more than 1,000.
This week, Cal-Maine Foods, Inc. – the largest producer and distributor of fresh shell eggs in the US – reported that one of the Company’s facilities in Kansas tested positive for avian flu, an outbreak that affects approximately 684,000 laying hens, equal to about 1.6% of the Company’s total flock.
“Production at the facility has temporarily ceased as the Company follows the protocols prescribed by the USDA. Cal-Maine Foods is working to secure production from other facilities to minimize disruption to its customers,” said a press release from the company. However, it noted that detections of avian flu at the facility do not pose an immediate public health threat.
USA Today cited experts on how the flu cases and more might impact egg prices in the immediate future.
“Seemingly every day there is another announced infection site, which not only physically reduces the actual number of egg layers, but also casts a negative psychology over the entire egg market,” said Kevin Bergquist, Wells Fargo Agri-Food Institute sector manager. “The reaction to supply stress is price increase.”
Holiday demand is also poised to contribute to price increases.
“Christmas is one of the times where egg consumption goes up for holiday meals, the eggnog and all that kind of stuff,” said Yuko Sato, a poultry extension veterinarian and diagnostic pathologist at Iowa State, according to USA Today. “So naturally, every year, the egg prices go up during Christmastime or holiday season.”
Some welcome news is that upcoming price increases won’t likely spike as high as they did in early 2023, said Dennis Brothers, associate extension professor at Auburn University’s agricultural economics and rural sociology department.
“Prices are going to go up, of course, because of seasonal demand, and this will start restricting inventory some. But we’ve got a lot of eggs on hand right now,” he said.
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