Egg Industry magazine’s 2019 Top Egg Company survey identified 67 egg producers whose flocks totaled 337.88 million hens housed on December 31, 2018. The Top Egg Company survey is conducted annually, and the results reported are comprised of a combination of company-submitted information and estimates made based on input from publicly reported information and industry sources. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Chicken & Egg Report released December 22, 2018, estimated the U.S. table egg laying flock to be 330.95 million hens on December 1, 2018.
Top 10 U.S. egg producers
Cal-Maine Foods retains its place at the top of Egg Industry’s Top Egg Company rankings, with 40.25 million hens housed on December 31, 2018. In addition to being the largest egg producer in the U.S., Cal-Maine is also the largest egg producer in the world, according to WATT’s Top Poultry Company rankings.
Rose Acre Farms remained the second largest U.S. egg producer, with 26.6 million hens housed. Versova Holdings L.L.C., which combines day-to-day operations of egg producers Centrum Valley Farms L.L.P., Trillium Farm Holdings L.L.C. and Iowa Cage-free L.L.P., moved up to the third position in the survey with 21.10 million hens housed. Hillandale Farms fell to fourth position with 20 million hens.
Daybreak Foods, with 14 million hens, rounds out the top five egg producers.
Michael Foods moved from seventh in last year’s survey to sixth position this year with 13.29 million hens. Rembrandt Enterprises fell to the seventh position in this year’s survey with 12.5 million hens. The Center Fresh Group, Midwest Poultry Services L.L.P., and Prairie Star Farms remained in the Nos. 8, 9 and 10 spots in this year’s survey with 10.5, 9.8 and 9.4 million hens, respectively.
Industry concentration
The level of concentration of the U.S. egg industry hasn’t changed much in the past five years. In the 2015 survey, the top five egg producers controlled the output of 34 percent of the hens reported in the Top Egg Company Survey. In the 2019 survey, the top five egg producers controlled the output of 36 percent of the survey’s hens. The amount of the country’s hens housed by the top 10 egg producers has increased from 50 percent in 2015 to 52.5 percent in 2019. There has been very little change in the proportion of the nation’s layer flock controlled by the top 20 producers in the past five years; in 2015, it was 72 percent vs. 72.5 percent in 2019.
Learn more about the world’s top egg producers:
www.WATTAgNet.com/directories/80-the-world-s-leading-broiler-turkey-and-egg-producers
