COBB COUNTY, Ga. — A Cobb County farmer said he has had to implement purchase limits on his eggs, as shoppers across the U.S. experience higher egg prices and rationing due to a strained supply chain, further worsened by an ongoing bird flu outbreak.
Dwayne Jones, the operations manager of Jones Family Farm in Powder Springs, Georgia, has been operating his family-owned farm since his parents purchased it in 1980. The farm raises 150-200 chickens, which produce about 100 eggs a day.
“The eggs are like gold right now,” Jones said.
Jones says he had to raise the prices before the egg shortage began due to increased feed prices, and he now sells a dozen eggs for $7.
Due to the bird flu crisis, local demand for his eggs has surged. He said he had to set a two-dozen purchase limit to prevent reselling.
“I’ve had to ask people to keep it to two dozen because I’m afraid some people have been coming in and buying all the eggs and then reselling them, which is not really fair to the other customers that come in and then there’s nothing for them,” Jones said.
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Bird flu has infected nearly 70 people in the U.S. since April and killed one person. It has wiped out about 159 million chickens, turkeys and other birds nationwide since the outbreak began in poultry in 2022.
“I’ve had a steady customer base for years. So I was already doing a good business, but I used to have enough surplus eggs to sell to retailers who resold them at farmer’s markets and stuff like that. I have been selling out every day and I’ve had at least five new customers a week since this egg shortage started, so I haven’t had any extra to sell to the retailers at all,” Jones said.
The bird flu, first detected in Texas dairy cattle last March, continues to spread across multiple states, impacting both poultry and cattle production.
“The profit margin is very slim because I have to buy the feed, it’s so expensive and just the cost of maintaining the facilities and everything else, it’s just there’s not a lot of money in it at all to produce a lot of eggs,” Jones said.
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