At the supermarket we see so many options for eggs.  From "Organic", "Free Range", "Cage Free", or even "Pastured" nowadays.

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Looking at the price variance in these available eggs, it is obvious that not all eggs are created equal!

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So what is the difference, and why would some be worth more?

About American egg production

STANDARD:

 

Some egg producers (74% in 2020) use cages known as battery-cages.  These are small, crate like, cages, where the laying hens are confined to sitting in one place.  Some states have made operating or selling eggs from these operations illegal, due to animal welfare concerns.  In these operations, the chickens are fed cheap Layer Feed and provided supplemental synthetic vitamins and minerals to allow for high production rates (lots of eggs per week!)  Due to the confinement and standardized rations, the chickens lay LOTS of eggs, but the nutritional quality of the eggs is low.  These eggs tend to be the cheapest since they are mass-produced

 

ORGANIC:

Most organically labeled supermarket eggs are raised in a like fashion to their standard counterparts and fed similarly, but feed is sourced from organic crops.  Due to the confinement and standardized rations, the chickens lay lots of eggs but the nutritional quality of the eggs is low, like the standard eggs.  The primary advantage of organic eggs is for the cropland that raised their feed.  These eggs tend to be more expensive than standard eggs due to the increase in feed cost from the organic feed.

 

CAGE FREE:

Because of the negative press, battery-cages receive,  an increasing number of egg producers are removing the cages.  In their production system the chickens are confined to their poultry house, but not in cages, and lay their eggs in special automated nests.  The feeding regime and subsequent labeling is as stated in the two sections above.

 

FREE RANGE:

The knowledge that confinement house eggs are nutritionally inferior to eggs from chickens allowed to range and forage drove some producers to offer eggs from free range chickens.  Unfortunately, when the industry discovered that these eggs could be sold for more they wanted to get in, and asked "what's the least I could change to get on this bandwagon".  Nowadays to be labeled free range, there must be a door on their confinement house that allows the chickens access to the outdoors, for at least a percentage of some days. The yard the chickens have access too does not need to be large and is therefore quickly turned to mud, offering no forage advantages for the chickens.  Most free range eggs in supermarkets come from these operations.

 

PASTURED:

Due to the perceived lack of integrity in the "free range" chickens labeling, farmers developed methods to raise chickens on actual pasture forage.  These systems are typically represented by a mobile coop that is moved to fresh locations before the surrounding forage is spent, allowing the chickens access to actual range forage continually.  Unfortunately, recently some producers have labled their eggs "pastured raised" while using confinement barns with a small yard, and added a little caveat (freedom to forage on open pasture) to their label, essentially they are the same thing as "free range".  Due to no legal definition, they can use the label without actually being what the consumer perceives they are buying.

Thankfully,  in most locations local farmers can be found using authentic pastured egg practices.