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Some eggs-act maths

Posted Friday, 10 February 2012 / Written by The Twig

We were delighted to read this piece in the Independent last week reporting that, in the UK this year for the first time we'll buy more free range eggs than intensively farmed ones. As we blogged at the beginning of the year "traditional" battery cages are now banned in the UK. We still have a large number of caged hens but they must now be kept in "enriched" cages. So, there is still a long way to go before we can claim to be a free-range country but it is definitely progress.

If you have yet to make the free range switch, consider this:

According to the International Egg Commission, the UK average egg consumption per person is approximately 180 eggs a year, or just under 3.5 eggs a week. For a family of 4 that works out as 14 eggs per week. Having just checked the Tesco website (because it's the biggest supermarket) we found the following prices:

Cheapest Value hens eggs (10 pack) £0.08 each
Free range eggs (two dozen) on multi-buy offer £0.16 each
Cage Free barn eggs (two dozen) on multi-buy offer £0.175 each
Cage Free barn eggs (dozen) £0.20 each
Free range eggs (dozen) £0.21 each

So yes, the cheapest Value eggs are, per egg, considerably less and that is probably why so many shoppers are put off from buying free range. But have they actually done the maths? For our family of four, eating an average number of eggs, even if they swap from the very cheapest to the most expensive eggs, that works out at an extra £1.82 a week. If they take advantage of the multi-buy offer, that reduces to a difference of just £1.12, for a whole family to eat better quality eggs from happy chickens. Just 28p per person. Of course, there are families in the country for whom these figures do make a real difference, but ask yourself if yours is really one of them. And if not, surely it's a price worth paying?

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