(NAFB) – Demand for table eggs tends to increase when holiday gatherings and cold weather encourage home baking and cooking.

In accordance, wholesale table egg prices, the prices retailers pay to producers for eggs, tend to increase ahead of holidays. Leading up to the 2021 holiday season, however, wholesale prices of table eggs in the United States declined as effects of COVID-19-linked flock adjustments linger. In normal years, producers anticipate seasonal demand by adjusting the size of the table-egg laying flocks and the rate they produce eggs.

In 2020, COVID-related disruptions in the demand for eggs led producers to reduce flock sizes. Flock sizes have slowly rebuilt since but remain smaller than the same time in 2019. However, the younger flocks produce more eggs per hen.

USDA’s Economic Research Service reported Tuesday that at the beginning of October 2021, the size of the U.S. laying flock was just above the October 2020 levels, and the rate of lay was 1.1 percent higher.