Download the full report and data tables.
We polled 1,000 Loblaw customers from May 7 to May 10 and the results show that due to egg carton designs and marketing claims, Loblaw customers are being misled into believing that eggs from caged chickens are cage-free.
For context, the cage confinement of egg-laying chickens has emerged as a prominent issue for Canadians. Heightened consumer familiarity, catalyzed by comprehensive media scrutiny and undercover exposés documenting severe food safety, quality, and animal welfare problems has prompted an avalanche of corporate cage-free egg commitments.
In 2016, Loblaw announced it would transition exclusively to selling cage-free eggs by 2025. Its rationale was articulated in its Corporate Responsibility Report that year, where the company stated, “Our customers expect that the products we sell are safe, of high quality, responsibly sourced, and produced in a humane way.”
While the company has since abandoned the 2025 timeline, it continues to assure customers that its ultimate goal remains to eventually only sell cage-free eggs. However, it recently disclosed that in 2023, a staggering 83% of the eggs it sold still came from chickens confined in cages. So, we polled Loblaw customers.
Respondents were shown images of various cartons of eggs from caged hens that depict farm scenes and asked whether they think the eggs are cage or cage-free. Overwhelmingly, far more respondents (in every single demographic group) mistakenly thought they come from cage-free hens than correctly identified them as coming from caged hens.
For example, our poll found that nearly half of Loblaw customers (46%) inaccurately believe that egg cartons with the term “Nestlaid” contain cage-free eggs, even though those eggs actually come from caged hens. Similarly, our poll found that 45% of Loblaw customers inaccurately believe that egg cartons with the term “Nature’s Best” contain cage-free eggs, even though those eggs come from caged hens.
Perhaps most strikingly, 82% of Loblaw’s customers would favour the company adding colour-coded shelf tags that identify which eggs are cage-free and which are not. As well, over three quarters of Loblaw customers (76%) favour open barns to cage confinement. That number is nearly identical (73%) when given the choice between open barns and so-called “enriched cages” (a type of cage used by some egg producers in Canada).
Along with the vast confusion over egg carton marketing, the results indicate that Loblaw consumers support open housing for hens and think they’re already buying cage-free eggs but are, in fact, being misled into purchasing eggs from caged hens.
Methodology: Results are based on an online study commissioned by The Accountability Board and conducted by Research Co. from May 7 to May 9, 2024, among 1,000 adult Canadians who have gotten groceries at Loblaws or Loblaws-affiliates in the last three months. The data has been statistically weighted according to Canadian census figures for age, gender and region in Canada. The margin of error—which measures sample variability—is +/- 3.1 percentage points, nineteen times out of twenty.
Download the full report and data tables.
For more information on this report, please contact:
Mario Canseco, President, Research Co.
778.929.0490
[e] mario.canseco@researchco.ca