Several breakfast staples saw sharp price increases due to a perfect storm of bad weather and disease outbreaks—and continued effects from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Egg prices increased 8.5% in January from a month earlier and are up 70.1% over the past year, the highest annual rate since 1973. The deadliest avian-influenza outbreak on record has devastated poultry flocks across the U.S., leading the price of eggs to rise more than any other grocery item in 2022, according to Information Resources Inc. U.S. egg inventories were 29% lower in the final week of December 2022 than at the beginning of 2022, according to the USDA.
Frozen, noncarbonated juices and drinks—a category that includes frozen orange juice—rose by 1.5% in January from a month earlier, and the 12.4% annual increase is the highest in over a decade. Florida orange growers are harvesting their smallest crop in nearly 90 years, the result of a freeze, two hurricanes and a citrus disease that is laying waste to its groves.
Breakfast cereal increased more modestly in January from a month earlier—just 0.4%—but prices in the category were up 15% over a year, in part because of elevated global grain prices resulting from disruptions related to the war in Ukraine.
Breakfast lovers might be better off just having a cup of coffee—but go with roasted, not instant. Prices for roasted coffee declined by 0.1% last month, but instant coffee rose by a 3.6% monthly increase for instant coffee.
This is a friggin sad state of affairs. Us Serfs are no longer entitled to 3 meals a day in #JoeBidens economy 🤨😱
— MichiganMelody 🌟🔥✨ (@Conserv76161604) February 17, 2023