Cracked Conspiracy: How Three Major Suppliers Artificially Inflated Egg Prices for Years

If you thought there was some price gouging going on with those high egg prices over the past few years, you were eggggggsactly right!

Cracking Down on Agricultural Collusion

We all remember the crazy high egg prices over the past few years. As it turns out, it was a big ole case of price gouging. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton worked with the Department of Justice to get to the bottom of the issue. Now, three prominent domestic egg suppliers are being held accountable for that elaborate price-fixing scheme that artificially jacked up the price of eggs.

Multi-State Conspiracy

The investigation into the multi-state conspiracy that ran from 2022 through 2025 involved a joint investigation involving 17 state attorneys general. They discovered that executive leadership at large distribution companies colluded to manipulate daily commercial bidding metrics. Specifically, the corporations actively coordinated their behavior to artificially manipulate the price indicators published by Urner Barry, an industry benchmark data service heavily relied upon by grocery chains and commercial food distributors to establish retail contracts.

How It Worked

Officials say it was a blatant case of market manipulation. In one example, a top-level Hickman's Egg Ranch official urged competitors at Centrum/Versova and Cal-Maine Foods to hyper bid to drive baseline valuations upward. When all three producers flooded the system with elevated bids, the benchmark service updated it's numbers accordingly, forcing Texas grocery shoppers to pay higher prices for eggs.

The Punishment

Cal-Maine Foods, Centrum/Versova, and Hickman’s Egg Ranch must collectively donate more than 7 million fresh eggs directly to community food banks scattered throughout the Lone Star State. In addition to the 53 million egg donations nationwide, the egg companies must also make a 3.3-million-dollar cash payment to participating states.

Preventing a Repeat Performance

To guarantee this doesn't happen again, the suppliers must immediately appoint independent corporate compliance officers. These executives will monitor commercial operations and must quickly report any potential future trade violations directly to state attorneys general and federal antitrust prosecutors.