Your 2021 Thanksgiving dinner is more expensive this year than it was last year, but still a bargain, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation.
Farm Bureau’s 36th annual survey indicates the average cost of this year’s classic Thanksgiving feast for 10 is $53.31 or less than $6.00 per person. This is a $6.41 or 14% increase from last year’s average of $46.90. The centerpiece on most Thanksgiving tables – the turkey – costs more than last year, at $23.99 for a 16-pound bird. That’s roughly $1.50 per pound, up 24% from last year, but there are several mitigating factors.
Farm Bureau “volunteer shoppers” checked prices Oct. 26 to Nov. 8, about two weeks before most grocery store chains began featuring whole frozen turkeys at sharply lower prices. Although the survey timeline is consistent with past AFBF Thanksgiving surveys, 2021 brought some unique differences. According to USDA Agricultural Marketing Service data, grocery stores began advertising lower feature prices later than usual this year. Also, the average per-pound feature price for whole frozen turkeys was $1.07 the week of Nov. 5-11 and 88 cents the week of Nov. 12-18, a decline of 18% in just one week. This means consumers who have not yet purchased a turkey should be able to find one at a lower cost than the Farm Bureau average.
“Several factors contributed to the increase in average cost of this year’s Thanksgiving dinner,” said AFBF Senior Economist Veronica Nigh. “These include dramatic disruptions to the U.S. economy and supply chains over the last 20 months; inflationary pressure throughout the economy; difficulty in predicting demand during the COVID-19 pandemic and high global demand for food, particularly meat,” she explained. Further, “The trend of consumers cooking and eating at home more often due to the pandemic led to increased supermarket demand and higher retail food prices in 2020 and 2021, compared to pre-pandemic prices in 2019.”
Meanwhile, USDA waited until November 12 to do its survey and came up with just a 5% increase, since the turkey was 88 cents a pound. Most of the other handful of food items USDA surveyed also cost less than the AFBF survey. Wonder where they are shopping?
Below are the average retail cost of Thanksgiving staples, based on AMS Market News Retail Reports for the week ending on 11/12/2021:
Frozen Turkey Hen (12 lbs.) – $0.88 cents per pound
Sweet Potatoes – $0.83 cents per pound
Russet Potatoes – $0.90 cents per pound
Cranberries – $2.22 per 12 oz. bag
Green beans – $1.64 per pound
Milk (1 gallon) – $3.75 per gallon
*Overall, this represents a 5.0% increase over last year for these selected items combined.