Wholesale egg prices have ‘plunged.’ Retail prices may follow

Wholesale egg prices have fallen significantly in recent weeks, a dynamic that may soon offer relief for consumers shell-shocked by record-high prices at the grocery store this year.

How quickly — and how much — retail prices will fall is unclear, however, experts said.

Wholesale prices dropped to $4.83 per dozen Friday, a 44% decline from their peak of $8.58 per dozen on Feb. 28, according to Expana, which tracks agricultural commodity prices.

The pullback comes amid a reprieve from major bird flu outbreaks so far in March and weaker consumer demand, which have helped the nation’s egg supply to start recovering, according to a U.S. Department of Agriculture market analysis published Friday.

Prices have “plunged,” said Karyn Rispoli, an egg market analyst and managing editor at Expana.

Market dynamics are also putting “extreme pressure” on wholesale prices to fall further, Rispoli wrote in an e-mail.

Consumers paid $5.90 for a dozen large grade-A eggs, on average, in February, a record high, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data. Retail prices have blown past their prior record — $4.82 per dozen in January 2023 — and have nearly doubled from a year ago.

Prices had surged amid a deadly outbreak of bird flu in the U.S., which has killed millions of egg-laying chickens and crimped egg supply, according to agricultural economists and market experts. The U.S. Department of Justice also opened an antitrust investigation into the pricing and supply practices of major producers.

However, bird flu outbreaks seem to have tapered off in March, at least for now.

“Slowing [bird flu] outbreaks are leading to improved supply availability and wholesale market prices have responded with sharp declines over the past week,” the USDA wrote.

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Consumers, dissuaded by high prices and purchase restrictions imposed by many grocers, have also been buying fewer eggs, helping to ease supply shortfalls, Rispoli said.

Households also stockpiled eggs because they feared prices would keep climbing — a flashback of sorts to consumer behavior witnessed in the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic — meaning there isn’t an immediate need for them to replenish supply, she added.

While there have been some early signs of easing prices, it’s unclear how rapidly — and to what extent — consumers may get more relief, experts said.

For one, there’s generally a lag of at least two to three weeks between a change in wholesale costs and subsequent retail pricing — meaning consumers are still largely “feeling the peak market when they go to buy eggs,” Rispoli said.

Plus, retailers ultimately choose “how closely they want to track wholesale prices,” she said.

Egg demand is also likely to stay elevated as the Easter holiday, which falls on April 20 this year, approaches, according to Kevin Bergquist, an egg analyst at the Wells Fargo Agri-Food Institute.

“Egg prices will likely remain highly variable for the near future, but at a higher-than-usual level,” Bergquist wrote in a March market update. “In the short term, we will likely see a continuation of high egg prices.”