Look for White Oak Pastures Eggs in your local Whole Foods Market in the Atlanta area!
In 2011, we stumbled into the pasture-laid egg business while developing the pasture-raised poultry market. I wish we had a better story, but the truth is, we were over-producing chickens. Due to slow sales, they became sexually mature and began laying beautiful eggs. Instead of letting them spoil in the pasture, we picked them up and took them to a couple of the farmer’s markets we were attending each Saturday. Shockingly, the farm staff working the farmer’s markets reported selling out of eggs in the first hour, so the next week, we doubled the amount we sent to market. Again, they reported selling out quickly after opening. So, we continued to double the farmer’s market orders until we made the decision to officially go into the egg business.
With our newfound confidence in the pasture-laid egg business, and a few thousand dollars, we built a processing room on the farm to wash, candle, and grade our eggs. We also invested in a sani-touch machine to give us the ability to scale our pasture-laid egg program. With the ability to produce two hundred plus cases of eggs each week, we visited our friends at Whole Foods Market. Without a lot of conversation and convincing, the leadership team in the South Region agreed to buy our pastured eggs, and we were relieved to have a home for these beautiful brown eggs.
In the summer of 2016, we experienced some flock health issues in our youngest set of layers, which dramatically decreased the amount of eggs we were able to collect each day. We were unable to fill Whole Foods’ egg order each week, and we had lowered production to a point that wasn’t cost effective for Whole Foods.
We are excited to announce that our delicious eggs are now back in Whole Foods! We’ve grown our laying flock to about 4,500 birds, and we are finally back in the egg business. We are grateful that Whole Foods is carrying our eggs again, and we hope that you will stop by one of their Atlanta locations to pick up a dozen or two. And while you are there, please give a big ‘thank you’ to the Whole Foods leadership, who completely embraces the ebbs and flows of local, regenerative, humane products. It’s wonderful to work with customers who have holistic, big-picture views.
