Big egg cartel: Major Australian suppliers accused of whipping up higher prices

The competition watchdog is taking Australia’s largest egg supplier to court for allegedly engaging in cartel conduct with a raft of other producers, accusing them of manipulating the market for at least six years and potentially driving up prices for consumers.

On Tuesday, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) launched legal action in the federal court against Sunny Queen, the country’s largest producer which supplies about a third of all eggs to retailers and has warehouses in all mainland states, as well as two companies that jointly own it – Doug Hall Poultry and McLean Farms.

In total, 12 suppliers are named in the legal action, comprising various holding companies and joint ventures related to the Doug Hall and McLean Farms operations – including Alpair, Ellerslie, Abbeyliz and Yallamundi – as well as independent Victorian producer Kinross.

Each of the entities is alleged to have engaged in cartel conduct, as well as engaged in a “concerted practice” with the purpose, effect or likely effect of substantially reducing competition. The case is the first the ACCC has brought under concerted practice prohibitions since they were introduced in 2017.

The ACCC is alleging the egg producers breached competition laws by coordinating on production and supply of cage, free-range and organic eggs.

Since at least October 2020, the key egg suppliers and producers coordinated on a range of business decisions – including production volumes, distribution, expansion plans and culling to manage perceived oversupply – in a way that likely substantially reduced competition for many years, the regulator alleges.

“Our investigation has uncovered alleged widespread anti-competitive conduct in the egg industry that we allege has impacted the supply of eggs to Australian consumers since at least 2020. This alleged conduct is extremely serious, which is why we have commenced this Federal Court action,” ACCC chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb said.

“Fair competition in the supply of fresh food such as eggs is extremely important. Anti-competitive conduct disadvantages Australian consumers, who can face reduced choice and higher prices, as well as those businesses seeking to compete fairly or who are seeking to enter markets to provide competing supply,” she said.

“Eggs are in every fridge for all Australian families … this is an important part of our families’ diets,” Cass-Gottlieb said.

A spokeswoman for Sunny Queen said the company has “cooperated fully” with the ACCC through its investigation.

“Sunny Queen denies the allegations and intends to defend the proceedings,” she said.

“Sunny Queen was founded by Australian farmers and has been supplying Australian families with eggs for more than 50 years. Over those five decades Sunny Queen has earned a reputation for ethical farming and consumer practices and remains committed to adhering to these high standards,” the spokeswoman said.

The allegations include a claim that Sunny Queen, Doug Hall and McLean Farms coordinated to purchase a property in Queensland “for the purpose of preventing its acquisition by rival egg suppliers” and that “this had the effect of substantially lessening competition”.

A years-long egg shortage had previously been attributed as a factor that pushed up egg prices since 2021, with recent bird flu outbreaks worsening the situation.

Matt Dalgleish, co-founder of agricultural market analysis firm Episode 3, noted that rising egg prices typically encourage increased production – in contrast to the claims of coordinated culling in the ACCC’s action.

The ACCC also alleges that Sunny Queen restricted how many eggs that independent rival Kinross could sell to customers, and explicitly prohibited the company from selling its eggs to Coles, Woolworths, Aldi, Metcash (the operator of IGA supermarkets) or Costco, as per an agreement the two struck in 2021. Aldi and its rivals – Coles and Woolworths – were contacted for comment.

Coordinating on egg supply numbers is another key allegation. In December 2021, Sunny Queen, Doug Hall and McLean Farms agreed to reduce their cage-egg supply by 200,000 dozen a week.

They also agreed to make corresponding reductions in free-range supply, along with Kinross, which agreed to reduce its free-range supply by 20,000 dozen a week, the ACCC alleged in its concise legal statement.

Across the country, commercial egg farmers produced about 17.2 million eggs a day for domestic consumption in 2025, according to the industry. Australians consume an annual average of more than 250 eggs per person, the ACCC said.

Sunny Queen was originally Queensland’s government-run egg board set up in 1930. It transitioned to an unlisted public company when the industry was deregulated in the 1990s, before being privatised when it was jointly acquired by the McLean and Hall families.

The Hall family began in the egg industry as Ellerslie, which namesake Doug grew from one farm near Toowoomba in the 1960s to a nationwide business. Its current director, Simon Hall, is Doug’s son. Simon and brother David were reportedly worth a combined $137 million in 2014, according to the Sunday Mail Queensland rich list.

In 2024, the Hall family sold a 60 per cent stake in the company to Canadian pension fund PSP Investments in a deal estimated to be worth $180 million.

The McLean family’s egg empire also emerged out of a single Queensland farm, founded by Arthur and Hope McLean in 1950. Initially focused on free-range production, the company has grown and expanded significantly, including acquiring a Victorian dairy farm last year for a reported $55 million.

The McLean’s children – Lynda, Chris, Jenny, Donna, Brian and Pam – now wholly own the company, while seasoned egg and agriculture industry figure Andrew Crocker serves as chief executive and managing director. Crocker is also deputy chair of the Board of Egg Farmers Australia.

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