We are committed to ethical food production and continuously raising the standards of the food system.
Our animal welfare practices are consistently and independently audited by Certified Humane and certain retailers. Our organic farms are audited by Oregon Tilth and Bioagricert according to USDA National Organic Program (NOP) standards.
We are transparent about what happens to male chicks as well as what happens once hens reach their post-laying life on our website here. As for the industry-standard practice of dulling the tips of hens’ beaks, that is not done to harm the birds, but to protect them. This process uses infrared technology to reduce the beak’s sharpness, so hens don’t hurt themselves or one another. See more information on beak trimming from Certified Humane, one of our auditors, here.
Vital Farms remains focused on doing right by our stakeholders, including animals and by those who love our pasture-raised eggs. For more information on our animal welfare practices, please visit our FAQs: https://vitalfarms.com/faqs/.
Finally, while some people believe that “vegan food is the only truly ethical choice”, millions of consumers enjoy eating eggs. We are pleased to offer products that value animals including by providing hens a meaningfully better life than the confinement they would face in the industrialized food system.
