LANSING, Mich. – The Michigan Attorney General, egged on by a recent report called Cracking Down on Kroger, has asked the Michigan division of Kroger to be more diligent about signage in its stores indicating when a carton of eggs is from cage-free hens or not.

In the letter dated March 23, an attorney for the Michigan AG, Jason Evans, called on Kroger to be more honest and clear about whether the eggs on its shelves were raised by birds that are cage-free, or not. “That report indicates that Kroger shoppers are being misled into buying eggs from caged hens wrongly thinking they are cage-free,” Evans writes. “Being clear about which eggs are from caged hens is particularly important in Michigan, as Michigan law will prohibit – beginning in 2025 – the sale of eggs from caged hens.” Evans could not be reached for comment regarding what will happen, if anything, should there not be enough cage-free eggs available by the 2025 deadline.  

According to the report Cracking Down on Kroger, by Data for Progress, 53 percent of Kroger customers think there should be clear signage at the stores indicating whether or not eggs have been produced by cage-free chickens, 12 percent do not want such signage and 35 percent don’t care one way or the other. According to Professor and Director of Animal Behavior and Welfare at Michigan State University (MSU) Janice Swanson, most egg producers in Michigan have already transitioned to aviary systems, which she regards as cage-free, meaning “chickens have a lot of room to move around in three dimensional space.” However, “producers have dealt with this in a variety of ways and some are in a transitional phase,” she said. “Going from a conventional cage system to cage-free requires a huge investment,” she added. Swanson noted that covid also “hampered the transition to cage-free.”

In 2009 the Michigan legislature amended the animal welfare law to stipulate that, within 10 years egg laying hens should be housed in cage-free systems and Kroger agreed to do that, although now the agreed upon date for this transition to be complete is 2025, due to covid and other factors. Kroger could not be reached for a comment. Another report on this topic, called The Transition to Cage-Free Eggs, included a survey of more consumers than did the Data for Progress report, according to Swanson. The report found that 56 percent of surveyed consumers were unaware of grocery store pledges to transition to cage-free eggs, 55 percent of consumers are primarily motivated by egg price, and egg producers nation wide believe that 51 percent of total egg production will be cage-free by January 2026.

Co-author of the report The Transition to Cage-free Eggs, agricultural economist and Prof. Vincenzina Caputo at MSU said the increased cost of eggs is attributed to various factors, including supply chain disruptions and avian flu outbreaks. “Legal mandates and private sector commitments to convert to 100 percent cage-free production by 2025 may worsen the issue by driving up egg prices even further,” she said. “Our report suggests that although egg producers anticipate an average revenue increase of approximately 8 percent from cage-free systems compared to traditional systems, the conversion costs are estimated to be at least 8 to 19 percent higher on average.” An executive summary of that report can be found at https://southeastagnet.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/UEP-CF-Report-Executive-Summary.pdf. A copy of Cracking Down on Kroger can be found at https://www.filesforprogress.org/memos/cracking_down_on_kroger.pdf.