Stores are offering holiday birds at bargain rates to bring customers in for other purchases.

By Joe Lombardi From Daily Voice

Thanksgiving cooks are finding a welcome surprise at the grocery store: lower turkey prices, thanks to deep discounting by major US retailers.

Shoppers across the Northeast are seeing frozen whole turkeys selling for well under $1 per pound at big chains like Walmart. 

This comes despite a sharp rise in wholesale turkey prices, which are up about 75 percent over the past year to $1.71 per pound, according to Purdue University’s College of Agriculture.

Stores are offering holiday birds at bargain rates to bring customers in for other purchases.

This aggressive pricing strategy, known as using turkeys as a “loss leader,” means stores may actually lose money on each bird sold, but hope to make up the difference with other higher-margin items in shoppers’ carts.

A packaged, 12-pound frozen turkey.

A packaged, 12-pound frozen turkey.

Daily Voice

The result is a cheaper Thanksgiving meal overall. The American Farm Bureau Federation’s annual survey found the average cost for a classic holiday dinner for 10 people dropped by 5 percent to $55.18 this year. 

The average national price for a 16-pound frozen turkey was $21.50, which is more than 16 percent cheaper than last year. That marks the third year in a row of falling costs for the traditional feast, and is well below the 2022 peak of $64.05.

Not every item on the Thanksgiving table is cheaper, though. Weather issues, supply-chain disruptions, and rising farm labor costs have pushed up prices for some side dishes. Fresh vegetable trays have jumped 61.3 percent, sweet potatoes are up 37 percent, frozen peas rose 17.2 percent, and whole milk is up 16.3 percent.

Despite this year’s drop, the total cost of a Thanksgiving meal is still about 19 to 25 percent higher than in 2019, before the pandemic.