Chino egg farm says they sell out of eggs by lunch time as shoppers boost demand

CHINO, Calif. (KABC) -- Recently, cars have been seen lining up every morning at Billy's Egg Farm and drive-thru store in Chino.

People said it was typically a five-minute wait. Now, it's about 25 minutes or longer.

"Usually there's a line but not this long. This is nutty," said John Han, who was waiting his turn Wednesday when he spoke with Eyewitness News.

Nationwide, millions of chickens have died due to exposure to the avian flu. Plus, with a higher cost of feed and labor means prices are going up and there are sometimes shortages on the shelves.

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"A lot of places are sold out on eggs and the house needs eggs," said customer Andrew Hedstrom.

Billy Mouw owns Billy's Egg Farm and said they have thousands of cage-free chickens.

"With grocery stores, their eggs are about three weeks old and they come from the Midwest," he said. "Here we have 30,000 chickens, all cage-free, and they can come to the drive-through and get eggs within an hour being laid from the chicken."

President of the California Poultry Federation Bill Mattos said all the birds lost in the Midwest, which he estimated to be between 40 and 50 million, are being replenished.

"Our egg producers here have not had the bird flu. Their bio security is very high, they're very conscious of the flying ducks, which bring the disease to their ranches," he said.

The price of eggs hit a peak of $7.50 a dozen in December. It has since gone down a bit to $5.97 a dozen on Tuesday - which is more than double the price from a year ago.

"I started seeing an increase through the Christmas season when the demand for eggs is greater and the store picked up a little bit, like I said, we're pretty busy normal days," said Mouw.

But there's good news. Mattos said the flu outbreak appears to have slowed in recent weeks, and the supply of eggs should start increasing.