How did vital farms perform in 2015 cycle?

During the 2015–2017 boom-and-bust cycle, Vital Farms’ experience was entirely different from commodity producers like Cal-Maine. The most important distinction is that Vital Farms was still a private, aggressively growing startup at the time (they did not hold their IPO until August 2020), so there is no stock chart to track.

Instead of being battered by the extreme volatility of the commodity markets, Vital Farms used this three-year cycle to scale from a regional brand into a national powerhouse. Here is how they navigated the period:

1. The 2015 Avian Flu Boom: Insulated and Expanding

When the 2015 Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) outbreak wiped out 50 million birds and sent conventional egg prices skyrocketing, Vital Farms benefited from a unique set of circumstances:

• Supply Chain Resilience: The 2015 bird flu primarily devastated massive, centralized factory farms holding millions of tightly packed hens. Vital Farms operated a decentralized network of small, independent family farms. Because their flocks were small and geographically spread out, they suffered almost no supply disruptions.
• The Narrowing Price Gap: As commodity egg prices surged to record highs in grocery stores, the price gap between standard eggs and Vital Farms’ premium pasture-raised eggs shrank significantly. This prompted many consumers to "trade up" and try the brand for the first time, driving rapid volume growth.
• Category Expansion: Flush with growth, 2015 was the year Vital Farms officially diversified beyond eggs, successfully launching its pasture-raised butter line.

2. The 2016–2017 Bust: Scaling Through the Glut

When the industry overcorrected and flooded the market with cheap eggs in 2016 and 2017, traditional producers hemorrhaged money. Vital Farms, however, continued its rapid upward trajectory for several reasons:

• A Different Consumer Base: By 2016, Vital Farms had successfully positioned itself in the premium ethical and health-conscious food category. Their target consumer was buying for animal welfare (the "108 square feet" standard) and perceived nutritional value, making them far less sensitive to the sudden availability of cheap, conventional cage eggs.
• National Retail Rollout: Rather than shrinking operations, Vital Farms was in the middle of a massive distribution expansion. During this period, they moved beyond specialty health food stores like Whole Foods and began aggressively capturing shelf space in conventional national grocery chains.
• Infrastructure Investment: In 2017, right at the bottom of the commodity market crash, Vital Farms doubled down on its growth by opening the first phase of "Egg Central Station" in Springfield, Missouri—a massive, centralized grading and packing facility required to support national scale. They also became a Certified B Corporation that year, solidifying their ethical branding.

In short, while the 2015–2017 cycle was a brutal roller coaster for the conventional egg industry, Vital Farms bypassed the crash because it was operating as a fast-scaling premium disruptor rather than a mature commodity producer.