The New York City Economy Tracker is a joint project betಞween Investopedia and , using publicly available data to evaluate the economic health of the city across a variety of metrics.

For the week of March 3, 2025 we're looking at how soaring egg prices are impacting businesses nationally and in New York City, including its impact on the NYC classic—the bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich.

Egg Prices Are Exploding

Egg prices are at an all time high in the U.S. As of January 2025, a dozen large Grade A eggs cost up to $4.95, the highest on record. The price is 2.7% more than the previous record high of $4.82 in January 2023. Eggs are a staple food in the American diet, eggs and omelets are the most consumed breakfast food for American adults age 20 and older as well as the largest source of breakfast protein, according to data from the USDA.

The main cause of the price hikes is the highly infectious bird flu, which has resulted in the loss of over 30 million hens in the first two months of 2025 alone. This totals out to about 12.2% of the conventional caged layer flock, 7.8% of the non-organic cage-free flock, and 0.1% of the organic flock that was present on 1/1/25. This shortage of eggs is causing inflation for retailers across the country as the USDA is looking at investing up to $1 billion dollars in temporary egg importation options as well as money to combat the bird flu.

Volatile Egg Market♍ Impacting National and NYC Businessꦍes

Some major restaurant chains are already feeling the impacts of soaring egg prices. Denny’s restaurants have already added a regionally-based egg surcharge on a variety of their classic breakfast dishes. Waffle House has implemented a blanket $0.50 per egg surcharge in all of its restaurants.

Local businesses in New York City are starting to crack under the pressure of higher egg costs as well. Local bodegas selling the iconic NYC bacon, egg and cheese breakfast sandwich have had to toe the line between price increases and eating higher costs to maintain their customer base. Francisco Marte, owner of Green Deli in The Bronx and president of the Bodega and Small Business Association told NY1 that he has had to raise the price of his bacon, egg and cheese sandwich from $4.50 to $6 based on egg prices. He also estimates that about half of the other bodegas around the city have had to increase prices for egg breakfast sandwiches as well.

Even buying in bulk isn’t helping the retailers of eggs in the city. Anthony Bonavita, who owns Benny's Deli & Catering in Ridgewood, Queens told Gothamist that costs for a full case of eggs have jumped from between $50 to $67 per case to between $215 to $225. For most of these businesses, selling egg items like a bacon, egg and cheese are typically loss leaders sold for low or negative margins to get customers in the door, so price hikes will be a delicate balance between raising them to meet the new bottom line and keeping them low enough so as not to alienate too many loyal customers.