California restaurants scrambling to stay afloat amid $9 egg prices: Its f-ing killing me

A bird flu outbreak across California farms has caused a major egg shortage — and local restaurant owners are scrambling to stay afloat amid higher costs, according to a report.Egg prices have spiked to nearly $9 a dozen – a staggering 70% increase from the year before, according to data from the United States Department of Agriculture.The situation is so dire that some Bay Area grocery stores have imposed purchase limits on eggs.But California restaurants that serve omelets and baked goods are struggling to survive as as the price for a case of eggs has shot up from $20 to as mush as $150.“It’s f—king killing me,” Cara Haltiwanger, owner of LA-based breakfast sandwich spot Calabama, told SFGATE.

“I’m an egg restaurant.I have to buy eggs no matter what, you know?”Haltiwanger opened Calabama last November — just as the bird flu started to wreak havoc across the state.

By last month, the bird flu had caused the deaths of more than 1.7 million chickens in Merced County and 1.1 million in Stanislaus County, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. Gemma Ballesteros, who owns Marley’s Treats in Hayward, Calif., said the egg shortage is hitting her bakery hard – especially on top of steep minimum wage increases and pandemic-era challenges, like a drop in catering orders and rising costs for rent and utilities.“It’s so bad right now,” Ballesteros told SFGATE.“When we first opened the bakery, a case was roughly $28 to $32, and in recent weeks I’ve seen them go for as much as $125 a case.

It comes to a point where I can’t just raise the pricing.It’s dessert.

It’s more of a luxury than a need.”The soaring egg prices are making it near impossible for her to stay open, she said.“All the factors of operating a brick-and-mortar, it’s just not making sense,” she told SFGATE.“It’s hard to fight back when all of this just keeps increasing.

It’s been a fight for survival, and the eggs are making it so much worse.I can’t ...