Crunch time for cage-free
By LewisBollard @ 2025-06-20T02:36 (+151)
Note: This post was crossposted from the Open Philanthropy Farm Animal Welfare Research Newsletter by the Forum team, with the author's permission. The author may not see or respond to comments on this post.
Despite setbacks, battery cages are on the retreat
My colleague Emma Buckland contributed (excellent) research to this piece. All opinions and errors are mine alone.
It’s deadline time. Over the last decade, many of the world’s largest food companies — from McDonald’s to Walmart — pledged to stop sourcing eggs from caged hens in at least their biggest markets. All in, over 2,700 companies globally have now pledged to go cage-free.
Good things take time, and companies insisted they needed a lot of it to transition their egg supply chains — most set 2025 deadlines to do so. Over the years, companies reassured anxious advocates that their transitions were on track. But now, with just seven months left, it turns out that many are not.
Walmart backtracked first, blaming both its customers and suppliers, who “have not kept pace with our aspiration to transition to a full cage-free egg supply chain.” Kroger soon followed suit. Others, like Target, waited until the last minute, when they could blame bird flu and high egg prices for their backtracks.
Then there are those who have just gone quiet. Some, like Subway and Best Western, still insist they’ll be 100% cage-free by year’s end, but haven’t shared updates on their progress in years. Others, like Albertsons and Marriott, are sharing their progress, but have quietly removed their pledges to reach 100% cage-free.
Opportunistic politicians are now getting in on the act. Nevada’s Republican governor recently delayed his state’s impending ban on caged eggs by 120 days. Arizona’s Democratic governor then did one better by delaying her state’s ban by seven years. US Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins is trying to outdo them all by pushing Congress to wipe out all state bans on the sale of caged eggs entirely.
The European Commission missed its pledge to propose an EU-wide cage phase-out by 2023. And the UK’s Labour government remained non-committal on phasing out cages there in a Parliamentary debate this week.
Some industry voices are now cheering that the move to cage-free is stalled. Is it?
Cage half full or half empty?
Not really. Despite the setbacks, 45% of US hens, 62% of European hens, and 82% of British hens are now cage-free — up from about 13%, 44%, and 50% respectively a decade ago. Fully 150 million fewer American, European, and British hens are now caged than a decade ago, even as egg demand has risen in all three markets.
This is a big deal. Because this progress has compounded over multiple generations of hens, well over 300 million individual birds have now been spared life in a battery cage. And, assuming this progress sticks, it won’t be long before that number is a billion. I think this will be the most animals any animal welfare intervention has ever helped.
In fact, most companies with cage-free pledges — over 1,400 — have already implemented them. They include America’s largest fast food chain (McDonald’s) and coffee chain (Starbucks), and two of its largest retailers (Amazon and Costco). All five of America’s largest packaged food manufacturers — General Mills, Kraft Heinz, Mondelez, Nestle, and PepsiCo — are on track to be there by year-end too.
European companies are doing even better. Seven of the UK’s top 10 supermarket chains have stopped selling caged eggs entirely, as have almost all major German supermarkets. French and Italian supermarkets, which started from much a lower base, are not far behind (see chart below). As a result, all four countries look on track to phase out cages entirely in the next 5-10 years.
Even the laggards have made progress. Walmart, Kroger, Target, Subway, Best Western, Albertsons, and Marriott all appear to be selling or using at least 25% cage-free cages — well short of where they promised to be, but enough to spare over 30 million hens in their collective supply chains from cages. (Though this may be mainly due to laws stopping them from selling caged eggs in seven US states.)
And then there are the sales of actual cages. Last year, I visited the world’s largest poultry industry trade show, in Atlanta, Georgia, and asked the makers of hen housing systems about their sales. They almost all said they’d stopped selling new cages in North America and Europe — and many had stopped selling them in Latin America too.
Eggstraordinary Eggscuses
Still, the companies’ excuses for breaking their cage-free promises are galling. Corporate PR teams have largely settled on three: weak customer demand, high prices, and inadequate supply. Let’s take each in turn.
Customer demand. Kroger’s excuse is typical: it explains that “the proportion of cage-free eggs purchased by our customers has increased slowly.” But Kroger didn’t pledge to just wait and see if its customers would buy 100% cage-free eggs by 2025. It pledged to stop selling caged eggs, and could easily do so, as Amazon, Costco, Sprouts, Trader Joe’s, and Whole Foods all have — and as Kroger has in the seven states that require it do so.
But let’s say that’s too radical. Why not just label the caged eggs? Even as supermarket chains insist that their customers want caged eggs, they refuse to accurately label these eggs as “caged.” Instead, they let producers slap all kinds of deceptive labels on caged eggs (see image below). Customers are not demanding caged eggs; they’re demanding cheap eggs. Which brings us to the price of eggs…
Prices. Target frames its failure to meet its pledge in equity terms, stating “cage-free eggs are significantly more expensive than conventional eggs, which are the most affordable protein option we offer for families.” And it’s true that cage-free eggs are often significantly more expensive than caged eggs at Target. At the time of writing, the cheapest dozen cage-free eggs at a Target in Chicago were $4.69, a full $1.70 more than the cheapest caged eggs, at $2.99.
This is curious: cage-free eggs currently cost US egg producers just 19 cents more per dozen to produce than caged eggs. And in neighboring Michigan, which bans the sale of caged eggs, Target is selling a dozen cage-free eggs for … $2.99. The same holds true for every other supermarket chain I checked: in most states they’re selling cage-free eggs for a premium of $1 (Kroger) to $2.50 (Publix). But in states where they can only sell cage-free eggs, they sell them for the same price as caged eggs elsewhere.
Supermarkets are likely taking a fatter margin on cage-free eggs because they know many consumers will pay it. So high prices are actually a sign of customer demand. But in states without caged eggs, supermarkets price cage-free eggs for all consumers — and use organic or pasture-raised eggs as their high margin product. If they did so everywhere, they’d only be left with one excuse: the “supply crisis.”
Supply. US Foods blames “market forces outside our control,” especially the bird flu crisis, for its failure to go cage-free. Chick-fil-A blames the bird flu and mysterious “numerous industry dynamics.” But neither company had made much progress before bird flu hit. And the availability of caged eggs has fallen more than that of cage-free eggs since bird flu hit.
Nor are egg producers lacking the funds to invest in cage-free expansion — they’re making record profits on high egg prices. (Record-enough to have prompted a price-fixing investigation.) In a recent survey of major US egg producers, 49% expected no cage-free egg shortages this year or next and 48% expected only brief shortages.
Outside the US and Europe, the cage-free supply chain is less developed. But it’s rapidly growing: top egg producers in China, Brazil, and Malaysia are all investing in large new cage-free farms. And in countries where supply isn’t yet consistent, cage-free impact incentives allow companies to offset their use of caged eggs at some stores by buying extra cage-free eggs elsewhere.
Cracking down on broken promises
Advocates now have three main priorities. The first is to get the largest laggard US and European companies to follow through on their pledges — whether this year or in the coming years. US advocates are focusing first on Ahold-Delhaize, the sixth largest supermarket group, which in December delayed its cage-free deadline by a cool seven years, and Subway, which hasn’t shared its cage-free progress in years.
The second priority is to expand cage-free progress globally. The immediate focus is on multinationals with global cage-free pledges. Some, like hotel giants Accor and Hilton, are making good progress. Others, like Best Western and Marriott, are not — and are the subject of new campaigns.
The third priority is to enshrine cage-free progress in law. In the US, the focus is on protecting state bans on the sale of caged eggs from repeal attempts at the state and federal levels. In Europe, the focus is on getting the European Commission to propose a long-overdue ban on cages across the EU. This week the Commission announced a call for evidence on a potential cage ban — EU citizens can weigh in here by 16 July.
An end to a century-long experiment in cruelty?
Battery cages are the product of perhaps the most unfortunate randomized control trial in history. In 1931, a Pennsylvania metalworker named Milton Arndt put 220 birds outside and 220 indoors in “batteries” of cages. Regrettably for chickenkind, the caged birds, unable to waste calories on exercise, both ate less feed and laid more eggs than the outdoor birds. Long before “factory farm” became a slur, Arndt triumphantly proclaimed that he had invented “the chicken factory.”
In the century since, these cages have confined over 100 billion animals to lives of abject misery — unable to so much as flap their wings in their overcrowded microwave-oven-sized prison cells. It’s trendy in certain circles to question whether cage-free is any better. But, according to the most comprehensive analysis to date, it’s not even close.
There’s still much work to do. Hundreds of companies are trying to break their cage-free pledges. Thousands more haven’t yet committed to go cage-free. And, as a result, billions of hens are still suffering. We can’t let up in our efforts to help them.
But take a moment to reflect how far we’ve come. A mere 13 years ago, the Humane Society of the US, despairing of ever getting the US egg industry to go cage-free, backed a compromise to legislate an industry transition to larger “enriched cages.” When the pork industry — triggered by the specter of any farm animal welfare legislation — sank the compromise, it looked like battery cages were here for good.
Then advocates got to work. With fewer than a thousand full-time advocates globally, the movement waged campaigns that have now spared over 300 million hens from cages. That’s over 300,000 hens per advocate. Wayne Hsiung, who initially opposed cage-free campaigns, recently called them “in terms of influence on the industry … likely the most successful campaign in animal rights history.” I’m inspired by that success — much of it achieved by readers of this newsletter — and I hope you are too.
If you enjoyed this, you might enjoy my recent appearance on Liv Boeree’s Win-Win podcast:
David_R 🔸 @ 2025-06-22T22:22 (+13)
Thank you for another banger Mr. Bollard!
Judging from cage free egg prices I had no idea that cage free eggs currently cost just $0.01-0.02 more per egg. And almost all supermarkets just mark it up $0.08-0.20.
Please keep up the great work and fighting those greedy bastards.
PabloAMC 🔸 @ 2025-06-21T09:22 (+10)
As the post says, it may be worth for europeans to provide feedback to the EU Commission on the new animal welfare public consultation: https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/14671-On-farm-animal-welfare-for-certain-animals-modernisation-of-EU-legislation_en
Emrik @ 2025-06-25T10:03 (+5)
@LewisBollard[1] Hi! Please ignore this comment if you judge your time is better spent elsewhere, and have a good day!
If unable to find better uses of your time, however, and if you fancy spending it writing a (quick) response directly addressing the 2 main claims made in this feedback[2] from the Bulgarian Poultry Union, then I'd be happy to send it in as a Norwegian[3], unless you can just post it directly yourself.
- Banning cages will "incur immense financial losses..."
- And they appear to have done a mathematics somewhere in secret (no citation), quantifying the cost of a ban as "...requiring vast new investments in facilities (1,200 decares agricultural land, 600 for buildings), and tripling labor demand."
- And "a severe deficit of eggs, leading to manifold price increases for consumers."[4]
- Cage-free "lacks conclusive scientific justification for enhanced welfare outcomes."
I mention it because it seems potentially especially-usefwl to provide feedback directly addressing specific other feedback there,[5] so as not to let outrageous industry claims go unchallenged (into whatever is the product of the assessment).
Their claims/details are irrelevant regardless of accuracy, of course, as the welfare priority dominates any plausible range in financial costs. But whoever's reading the feedback is doing so with the aim of producing a policy recommendation. Their job-situation implies a need to use transparent reasoning & legible evidence, and moral persuasion is less effective. They're likely to be extra sensitive to specific details at all.
- ^
I'm tagging you because I suspect you may already be armed with the relevant citations/arguments, and because doing it (up to adequacy) myself seems not-top-priority for the time I estimate it would take me (given extenuating circumstances, comparative ineptitudes, and an irreparable tendency to ramble & stay up past bedtime whenever I write anything grr >.<).
- ^
> "On behalf of the Bulgarian Poultry Union (BPU), representing over 90% of Bulgaria's poultry producers, we emphasize our profound concerns regarding the proposed EU ban on cage systems for poultry. While the BPU supports high animal welfare standards, we assert that the transition away from enriched cages, currently housing 70% of Bulgarian laying hens, lacks conclusive scientific justification for enhanced welfare outcomes. We contend that the decision appears driven more by policy aspirations than by direct, universal scientific evidence. The economic implications for Bulgaria are catastrophic. A ban would incur immense financial losses, requiring vast new investments in facilities (1,200 decares agricultural land, 600 for buildings), and tripling labor demand, further straining an already deficient workforce. This would destabilize rural economies. We foresee a severe deficit of eggs, leading to manifold price increases for consumers, particularly those with lower incomes. This would inevitably necessitate imports from third countries, often utilizing conventional, lower-welfare cage systems, creating a significant policy paradox. Therefore, the BPU unequivocally demands the following essential measures to ensure a just and sustainable transition: A minimum 15-20 year amortization period for existing enriched cage installations (2010-2025). A comprehensive 10-15 year transitional period for new facility construction. Establishment of robust EU-level financial mechanisms, including substantial grants and favorable loans, for re-equipment projects. Full compensation for unrecovered investments for producers unable to amortize equipment within the transition period. Imposition of substantial tariffs and equivalent welfare standards on egg and egg product imports from third countries to prevent unfair competition. The BPU views this as a fundamental issue for the entire EU poultry sector and calls for a broad, inclusive public discussion to achieve a balanced decision that considers the interests of producers, consumers, and long-term food security."
- ^
Or somebody from EU could be acquired, I'm sure; though I suspect it doesn't matter too much for this particular feedback.
- ^
...what a clever phrase. Brain can double-read it as "manyfold price increase" (when parsing for importance) + "manifold price increases" (when parsing for plausibility, separately in parallel).
- ^
( Hmm, isn't that sorta like butting in and trying to do their job for them..? Yes! :D )
Constance Li @ 2025-06-24T20:31 (+5)
Thanks for this great analysis Lewis and Emma! I am curious if cage-free enforcement campaigns will continue to be a funding priority for OP after the 2025 deadlines and how it compares to other interventions like the ones given in this recent post, Systems Change 101.
I think this is a good quote from that post:
In animal welfare, cage-free campaigns help millions of animals but don't necessarily address the economic incentives and cultural narratives that will lead to future animal suffering.
While I do think that cage-free has led to some major improvements in economic incentives (though not enough because otherwise companies and states wouldn't be as resistant to fulfilling the commitments) and cultural narratives ("cage-free" for eggs is as recognizable as "cruelty-free" for animal testing), I suspect there may be diminishing marginal returns in terms of cost-effectiveness (people already know what "cage-free" is and the companies that were easy to convince have already been campaigned against).
Vasco Grilo🔸 @ 2025-06-20T14:52 (+4)
Thanks for the post, Emma and Lewis!
This is a big deal. Because this progress has compounded over multiple generations of hens, well over 300 million individual birds have now been spared life in a battery cage. And, assuming this progress sticks, it won’t be long before that number is a billion. I think this will be the most animals any animal welfare intervention has ever helped.
The Shrimp Welfare Project (SWP) estimates the electrical stunners they bought will be helping 3.3 billion shrimp per year once they are all operational, 11.0 (= 3.3*10^9/(300*10^6)) times the 300 M hens helped by cage-free corporate campaigns. In terms of welfare, for my estimate of 0.0426 DALYs averted per shrimp helped by SWP, this has averted 141 MDALY (= 0.0426*3.3*10^9). For my estimates of 0.452 DALYs averted per hen-year improved by cage-free corporate campaigns, and 1.34 hen-years per hen, the campaigns avert 0.606 DALYs per hen (= 0.452*1.34), and have therefore averted 182 MDALY (= 0.606*300*10^6) in total, 1.29 (= 182/141) times as much as SWP has. There is lots of uncertainty in many numbers. I would say SWP over the past few years has increased the welfare of shrimps roughly as much as all cage-free corporate campaigns have increased the welfare of hens.
Accounting for soil nematodes, mites, and springtails, I think GiveWell's top charities have increased animal welfare much more than cage-free corporate campaigns. I estimated GiveWell's top charities are 8.05 (= 1.69/0.210) times as cost-effective as cage-free corporate campaigns accounting for target beneficiaries and soil animals, and I also think GiveWell's top charities have received much more funding, such that their cumulative impact has been much more than that of cage-free corporate campaigns.
Then advocates got to work. With fewer than a thousand full-time advocates globally, the movement waged campaigns that have now spared over 300 million hens from cages. That’s over 300,000 hens per advocate.
Interesting! Assuming the number of advocates increased from 0 to 1 k over 13 years[1], 2 k hours per advocate-year, an hourly rate of 25 $/h, and 10 hen-years improved per hen helped due to cage-free corporate campaigns anticipating the transition to cage-free by 10 years, the cost-effectiveness would be 9.23 hen-years improved per $ (= 300*10^6*10/((0 + 1)/2*10^3*13*2*10^3*25)), which is 85.5 % (= 9.23/10.8) of what I assumed in my analysis.
- ^
But take a moment to reflect how far we’ve come. A mere 13 years ago, the Humane Society of the US, despairing of ever getting the US egg industry to go cage-free, backed a compromise to legislate an industry transition to larger “enriched cages.” When the pork industry — triggered by the specter of any farm animal welfare legislation — sank the compromise, it looked like battery cages were here for good.
EdoArad @ 2025-06-22T16:43 (+2)
Prices. Target frames its failure to meet its pledge in equity terms, stating [...]
From Chicken Watch, we find Target's 2016's commitment. There, it's stated that
We Will:
- Transition to only cage-free shell eggs by 2025, pending available supply.
While in their 2025 report linked above (this), and in their website , it's framed as a goal rather than a commitment:
Eggs: In 2016, Target set a goal to transition to a 100% cage-free egg supply chain by 2025 pending available supply.
I'm curious about the legality of this. Did they initially frame it as a commitment? Assuming their argument about unavailable (cheap) supply doesn't hold, are they legally bound to uphold their commitment?
Jason @ 2025-06-23T04:24 (+8)
Many commitments are not legally binding -- generally, you can say that you're going to do something and then change your mind without any sort of legal penalty. Any other rule would lead to even more litigation than we already have. What would the theory be for Target's promises in 2016 being binding?
The document I saw doesn't look like a contract -- I don't see any evidence of a counterparty who provided consideration in exchange for Target's promises. There are circumstances in which a contract-like claim will lie despite the absence of an actual contract (e.g., various forms of estoppel). But courts are hesitant to apply those circumstances broadly. Among other things, we'd usually be looking for a litigant who reasonably relied on a clear and definite promise to their detriment and suffered a clear-cut injury as a result. The potential injuries here strike me as less than clear-cut, and the promise as less than clear. Available is vague to my ears, rather than clear and definite.
EdoArad @ 2025-06-23T10:56 (+2)
Thanks! This really clarifies the situation for me.
SummaryBot @ 2025-06-20T13:01 (+1)
Executive summary: While many major food companies are failing to meet their 2025 cage-free egg pledges, the global shift away from battery cages continues to gain ground, with over 300 million hens already spared and legal, corporate, and supply-side momentum steadily building—suggesting that, despite setbacks, the movement may be one of the most impactful in animal welfare history.
Key points:
- Many major corporations are backtracking or stalling on their 2025 cage-free commitments, citing weak customer demand, high prices, and limited supply—though these excuses often contradict data or hide misleading practices (e.g., lack of accurate egg labeling).
- Despite these setbacks, substantial progress has been made globally, with 45% of U.S., 62% of European, and 82% of British hens now cage-free, amounting to over 300 million birds spared from cages over the past decade.
- Numerous companies have successfully implemented cage-free pledges, including McDonald’s, Starbucks, Amazon, Costco, and major European supermarkets—indicating that transition is feasible when prioritized.
- Excuses from lagging companies often don’t hold up, with data showing cage-free eggs only marginally more expensive to produce, retailers inflating margins, and industry surveys forecasting minimal supply shortages.
- Advocates are now focused on holding remaining companies accountable, expanding cage-free reforms globally (especially among multinationals), and pushing for legal protections, such as defending state-level cage bans and urging EU-wide legislation.
- The movement’s scale and impact are historically significant, with advocates achieving measurable welfare gains through strategic campaigning, described as potentially “the most successful campaign in animal rights history.”
This comment was auto-generated by the EA Forum Team. Feel free to point out issues with this summary by replying to the comment, and contact us if you have feedback.