MILWAUKEE — Ongoing issues over the past few months when it comes to egg supplies in the United States appear to have culminated in grocers scrambling to try and keep up with demand as prices keep climbing.

“We’ve heard from retailers over the past few days about both price and supply challenges that they’ve been having,” said Mike Semmann, president and CEO of the Wisconsin Grocers Association. “Of course, this follows the seasonal demand high we see right over the holidays as well.”

Semmann said that while overall demand for eggs in the U.S. is at a roughly 50-year high, with demand climbing month-to-month over the past 20 months straight, the United States Department of Agriculture anticipates production should climb by roughly 3% in 2025, so hopefully any issues with egg supply and egg sales are short-lived.

In December alone, cartoned eggs in Midwest went up about $1.65 per dozen, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Weekly Egg Market Report from last week. An outbreak of avian flu is one of the reasons prices have recently shot up and become more difficult to find in stores.

“I think it’s going to be a few more months before we see a little bit of an uptick [in production], but retailers are optimistic that this is a temporary situation,” Semmann said.

Watch the full interview above.