Wholesale egg prices have ‘blown way past’ record highs, analyst says

Wholesale egg costs have actually eclipsed record levels as the U.S. scrambles to include a bird-flu break out– and customers might quickly see more sticker label shock at their regional grocer as an outcome, according to experts.

On Friday, typical wholesale costs for big, white shell eggs reached $8 a lots, beating the previous record by a big degree, according to information from Expana, which tracks farming product costs.

” The previous all-time high was late December 2022 heading into Christmas, when we touched $5.46 per lots,” Ryan Hojnowski, a market press reporter at Expana, composed in an email. “Naturally we have actually blown method past that this time.”

There’s a lag by a couple of weeks before those wholesale rate walkings appear in stores, Hojnowski discussed. How carefully market price characteristics track those of wholesale costs will differ by grocer, he stated.

At a time when U.S. inflation has actually relieved broadly, egg inflation has actually triggered stress and anxiety for customers.

Sellers like Trader Joe’s and CostCo have actually enforced some limitations on customers’ egg purchases due to greater costs.

What’s more, the Waffle Home dining establishment chain started charging consumers an additional 50 cents per egg for each order. It’s not the only dining establishment to do so. Some regional dining establishments have actually likewise increased the expense of egg meals for consumers, according to a current Wall Street Journal report, which mentioned examples like like Storm’s Drive-In in Texas and Kroll’s Restaurant in Fargo, North Dakota.

Customers paid about $4.15 for a lots big, grade A eggs, usually, at the retail level in December, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Stats information.

While shy of the record retail high of $4.82 per lots in January 2023, list prices are up 65% from about $2.51 in December 2023– and rate pressures do not seem alleviating.

” Extremely pathogenic bird influenza,” more typically referred to as bird influenza, is the main motorist of egg rate inflation, specialists stated.

The illness– extremely contagious and deadly amongst birds– has actually eliminated countless chickens at industrial egg farms and minimized egg supply, specialists stated. To avoid spread, farmers need to eliminate their whole flock if they spot a case.

More than 40 million egg-laying chickens passed away in 2024, about 13% of the nationwide overall, stated Amy Smith, vice president of Advanced Economic Solutions, a financial consulting company concentrating on farming products.

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As a result, stocks of shell eggs are approximately 15% to 16% listed below the five-year average, stated Smith, pointing out U.S. Department of Farming information. (There’s presently about 1.2 million cases of 30-dozen eggs in shell-egg stock, according to USDA information.)

The majority of the egg-laying chickens– almost 22 million– passed away in the 4th quarter of 2024 alone, producing a supply shock that ran headlong into peak seasonal need around the winter season vacations, when more homes purchase eggs for baking dishes, for instance, Smith stated.

Wholesale costs “are triple, quadruple where we were a year earlier,” Smith stated. The runup is “really substantial,” she stated.

Depending upon the grocer, customers might not see rate flare-ups drip down to keep racks rather as drastically.

” Big nationwide sellers like Walmart and Aldi typically have more versatility to soak up wholesale rate boosts,” Hojnowski composed.

They might have the ability to balance out those greater wholesale expenses through more powerful margins on other food, or by protecting a few of their egg supply on fixed-price agreements, which lots of do, he stated.

Nevertheless, smaller sized, independent sellers do not have the exact same economies of scale and require to preserve success on each product they offer, “leading them to change costs faster in action to wholesale modifications,” Hojnowski stated.

Bird influenza has actually pestered egg farms into 2025, too, suggesting supply might continue to be affected, specialists stated. More than 22 million egg-laying chickens at industrial farms have actually passed away of bird influenza up until now in 2025, according to USDA information.

Bird influenza does not appear to have actually had as big an effect on farms that raise chickens for meat rather of eggs– a minimum of not yet.

Typical retail egg costs increased about 170% from December 2019 to December 2024, according to BLS information. By contrast, the typical market price for one pound of fresh, entire chicken increased about 42% throughout that time. A pound of boneless chicken breast meat leapt about 32%.

All boost more than typical U.S. inflation in general throughout that time, as determined by the customer rate index, which increased about 23%.

That’s mostly since of how bird influenza has actually affected various kinds of chickens, specialists stated. Chickens raised for eggs are various from those raised for chicken meat, which are referred to as “broilers.”

About 7.5 million broilers have actually passed away from bird influenza because October, when the most recent illness break out started, stated Matt Busardo, group lead of U.S. poultry reporting at Expana. By contrast, more than 20 million egg layers have actually have passed away because the start of 2025.

” This alone supplies a clearer image of why egg costs have actually increased so drastically compared to chicken,” Busardo stated.

Wholesale chicken costs have actually increased gradually due to illness problems restricting accessibility, he stated. While those costs are “placed for more upward capacity,” the boost “might not always happen at the exact same rate as eggs, a minimum of in the meantime.”