The Dark History Of Aldi's Affordable Eggs

Aldi has made a name for itself by providing customers with quality items at good prices. There are certainly some things the grocery store chain gets right, like its great selection of delicious cheeses and dupes that are better than the name brand products. However, you might want to stay clear of other Aldi items, including its famously cheap eggs. Rose Acre Farms is one of the store's main providers of regular Goldhen Eggs. The company claims that humane animal treatment is part of its core values and boasts a United Egg Producers certification that supposedly supports this claim. However, investigations over the years tell another story.

In 2010, an undercover Humane World for Animals volunteer released a video that showed crowded pens littered with chicken corpses, and animals being roughly handled and held in cruel conditions in a Rose Acre Farms facility. A year later, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) reported that the company did not properly follow infectious diseases protocol. It's not surprising that in 2018 a salmonella outbreak was traced back to Rose Acre Farms, leading to a massive egg recall. That same year another FDA investigation yielded equally dismal findings. Inspectors reported live and dead rodents in several facilities, manure in laying houses, and saw workers brush eggs with devices that were stored in visibly unclean spaces, amongst other sanitary violations.

There seems to be a clear disconnect between Rose Acre Farms' claims of sanitation and cruelty-free treatment and what investigations reveal. Yes, 2010 was a long time ago and companies change over time, but the 2018 salmonella debacle shows that not much has actually been corrected. As if to prove our point, Rose Acre Farms confirmed an avian flu outbreak in one of its facilities in January 2025.

Bird flu remains widespread throughout not only the country but also the globe, and is one of the main reasons that egg prices are so high. Consumers are stuck in a vicious cycle of buying cheap eggs in order to be able to afford the product and then being subjected to massive egg recalls due to potential health threats. Though eggs are a staple food, Rose Acre Farms has consistently shown that it's unreliable in its humane and sanitary practices. 

By selling its products, Aldi puts in question the reliability of its egg suppliers, so you may want to think twice before getting eggs at one of its locations. Contracting salmonella or supporting the unnecessary mistreatment of animals just doesn't seem worth it. Maybe it's time to consider giving egg substitutes a chance (and here's the seven best to have on deck) — at least until companies correct these issues or prices come back down.