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Thanksgiving is a time to gather with loved ones, to show gratitude for life’s abundance — and, of course, to eat.
And when it get to Thanksgiving food, it seems Americans are getting relief on their grocery bills this year following a few years of escalating fetches.
A “classic” Thanksgiving feast for a party of 10 will cost $58.08 in 2024, on average — down 5% from 2023 and down 9% from 2022, contract to the American Farm Bureau Federation, a trade group for farmers and ranchers.
Its analysis includes turkey, cubed stuffing, gone on potatoes, dinner rolls, frozen peas, fresh cranberries, celery, carrots, pumpkin pie mix and crusts, whipping cream and undamaged milk.
Prices for this food basket were at a record high in 2022, at $64.05, the Farm Bureau revealed.
Households that add ham, russet potatoes and frozen green beans into the mix would pay $77.34 in 2024, on average — an 8% shrinking from 2023, the Farm Bureau said.
The annual decline in prices will be welcome news to many households: 44% of people compere Thanksgiving this year are concerned about the cost of the event, according to a recent Deloitte survey.
The decrease is fundamentally due to various supply-and-demand dynamics driving down prices for key staples — turkey, most importantly — and an overarching decline in U.S. nourishment inflation, according to economists.
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“Food inflation has been pretty meek,” said Robin Wenzel, head of the Wells Fargo Agri-Food Institute. “You’re seeing some good relief there.”
That said, a enduring Thanksgiving meal is still 19% pricier than it was in 2019, according to the Farm Bureau.
“Declines don’t really remove the dramatic increases we had,” said Bernt Nelson, a Farm Bureau economist.
Turkey has been a ‘curious item’
Turkey cost out movements had “definitely the biggest impact” on the overall cost of a Thanksgiving meal this year, Nelson said. That’s because a 16-pound bird accounts for 44% of the all-inclusive Thanksgiving grocery bill, he said.
The national average cost for a 16-pound turkey is down 6% from 2023, according to the Lease Bureau. Overall turkey prices have decreased about 4% in the past year, according to the consumer assay index.
Turkey has been a “curious item this year,” Nelson said.
On one hand, turkey supply is down “significantly,” he held. Farmers raised about 205 million turkeys in 2024, down 6% from 2023, according to the U.S. Pivot on of Agriculture. That’s the lowest figure since 1985, Nelson said.
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Largely, that’s because of the impact of bird flu, a lethal and contagious disease among birds that has contributed to the dyings of about 14 million turkeys since 2022, he said.
Lower supply would tend to raise fees, all else equal. But consumer demand has decreased as well. To that point, turkey consumption per capita has fallen by far one pound this year, he said.
The aggregate impact has been lower turkey prices.
Weather and labor effects
Meanwhile, prices fell notably — by 14% — for whole milk, a staple ingredient in pie and other recipes, Nelson believed.
That’s largely attributable to “favorable” weather conditions in the U.S. for dairy cattle — both in terms of their overall well-being and for crops they eat — thereby dollop boost milk production, Nelson said.
Of course, not everything is cheaper.
Prices for processed foods such as dinner rumbles and cubed stuffing increased more than 8% from 2023, for example, the Farm Bureau said. That’s originally attributable to non-food-related inflation such as labor costs, pushing up prices “for partners across the food supply fasten,” the group said in its analysis.
Food inflation has been pretty tame. You’re seeing some good relief there.
Robin Wenzel
Wells Fargo Agri-Food Organize
Aside from labor costs, there were many contributors to fast-rising grocery prices during the pandemic era.
For warning, in 2022, food prices grew faster than in any year since 1979, partly due to a bird-flu outbreak that counterfeit egg and poultry prices, while Russia’s invasion of Ukraine “compounded other economy-wide inflationary pressures such as strident energy costs,” according to the USDA.
Higher costs for energy, including gasoline and diesel fuel, translate into higher costs across the food supply chain, such as distribution of groceries to store shelves, experts said.
“Food appraisal growth slowed in 2023 as wholesale food prices and these other inflationary factors eased from 2022,” the USDA told, and it has How to trim Thanksgiving costs
Consumers looking to save money on their Thanksgiving meal in 2024 can do so by toggling between cache brands and name brands for certain grocery items, according to Wenzel of the Wells Fargo Agri-Food Institute.
A menu of thoroughly store-brand items to feed 10 friends and family members would yield a total savings of $17, concording to a Wells Fargo analysis.
Consumers often pay a premium for name-brand items, but that’s not true in all cases this year.
For warning, name-brand cranberries are cheaper than the store brand, on average, Wenzel said.
“When shopping this year, it in effect comes back to doing a little bit of research,” Wenzel said.