"price increase" news and stories

As if we didn't have enough reason to distrust our egg supply (remember the recall in November?), now we know why prices have gone up. And grocery wholesalers are suing.

Word is, four industry trade groups -- United Egg Producers, United Egg Association, United States Egg Marketers and the Missouri Egg Council -- conspired to manipulate supply to increase demand, thereby falsely inflating the price of eggs in the U.S. The prominent egg producers include Land O'Lakes, Cal-Maine Foods, Hillandale Farms and Ohio Fresh Eggs, among 14 others, according to a press release sent out by prosecuting firm Stueve Siegel Hanson, representing Associated Wholesale Grocers, Inc, among six others.

In order to cut down on supply, producers allegedly agreed to kill off hens, which resulted in at least a 40 percent increase in egg prices in 2008, reports the L.A. Times from the following civil complaint filed by Sodexo Inc. The trade groups also increased exports (to further dwindle U.S. supply) and reduced the number of hens per cage, which they marketed as a move towards animal health. That's just wrong.

The plan is said to have gone down as early as 1999, says The Kansas City Star (home of the lawsuit), and since then, egg prices have more than doubled, with a peak of $2.20 per dozen in March 2008 from $1 a dozen in March 2002.

The price of turkeys will be up this year, even though more will be available than in the past few years. Excuse me, but when have stores run out of turkeys for Thanksgiving? Well, I guess they want to be prepared just in case every family in America wants an extra bird or three. Basically the wholesale price of turkey has increased this year by about 17% and of course the retailers are passing it on to the customers. You will see better prices in frozen birds, but the fresh ones will have the highest prices. I for one always get a fresh bird and you couldn't pay me to buy one of those frozen, brine and artificial flavored bowling balls that masquerade as turkey. One more thing about turkeys this year. Due to the warm summer, many of the birds didn't gain as much weight as normal ,so you will see more of the smaller birds this year. That's something I like because it's easier to cook two smaller birds than one huge sucker, especially since I like to roast one and deep fry the other.

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