Months after egg prices skyrocketed to the highest they've ever been, Waffle House has announced it dropped its egg surcharge.
Visitors to the iconic diner chain were hit with a 50-cent per egg charge back in February of this year. The surcharge was a response to exceptionally high egg prices caused by bird flu related shortages. Egg prices hit a record high of $6.23 per dozen in March, but have since dropped to around $2.56 as of Tuesday.
The chain, which operates approximately 2,100 locations across the nation, said at the time that the surcharge would remain until egg prices stabilized.
In February, a two-egg breakfast, which comes with toast and a side, was listed at $7.75, according to the Associated Press.
“While we hope these price fluctuations will be short-lived, we cannot predict how long this shortage will last,” Waffle House said at the time. “We are continuously monitoring egg prices and will adjust or remove the surcharge as market conditions allow.”
At the time, Cracker Barrel, another iconic American breakfast chain, used Waffle House's surcharge to try to sway egg-hungry diners through its doors.
"A surcharge on eggs? Well, there’s nothing hospitable about that," Cracker Barrel said in a marketing statement at the time. "At Cracker Barrel, country hospitality is as important to us as a hearty breakfast — and that means not charging extra for eggs."
On July 1, Waffle House announced on its social media pages that its surcharge had ended back on June 2. It's unclear why the chain waited a month to announce the news.
While diners may be able to once again enjoy their eggs without an additional charge tacked on, they still cannot use their Waffle House ID’s to travel — a point the TSA had to publicly make this month.
Eggs are the chain's most-ordered item; in a year, Waffle House will serve approximately 272 million eggs, according to a CNN report.
More than half of those eggs come from Rose Acre Farms. In January, one of Rose Acres's farms was hit by the bird flu, which cut into its production.
President Donald Trump took the brunt of the criticism for the rising egg prices after he promised to bring them down as soon as he took office, though in truth there was little he could have done to counteract the millions of egg-laying birds that were destroyed due to the flu.
In February, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced a $1 billion investment to help farmers improve their biosecurity measures in an effort to cut down on bird flu infections.
The U.S. also increased egg imports from South Korea, Turkey, brazil, and other countries to help make up for the shortage.
Wells Fargo Agri-Food Institute Sector Manager Kevin Bergquist told FOX 5 Atlanta that the volume of egg and egg products imported into the U.S. increased by 77.5 percent during the first three months of the year when compared to the same period last year.
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