The Meat Case Weighs Sixty Cents More
Late September, the meat case hums
0:00 / 3:44
The Meat Case Weighs Sixty Cents More
Listener notes
This week the lens is one counter, walked end to end: the meat case. The track is a lo-fi soft-pop lullaby at a slow swaying pulse — Rhodes piano, brushed drums, and one close, dry-humored vocal reading the case like a bedtime list. The official year still leans up, by sixty cents a pound on ground beef; the sale signs this fortnight leaned the other way. The chorus hums everything went up again, and the verses spend their time disagreeing with it politely.
The newest official month is still August, and it barely moved. Food at home sat at 321.5, a tenth of a point under July's 321.643 and 2.2% above a year earlier. The meats, poultry, fish, and eggs index edged up 0.25% in the month, to 351.501, and stood 1.15% above August 2025. 12 So the year is visible at the counter, and almost nowhere else.
Where it shows: BLS U.S. city averages for August 2026, with July and last August beside them. Ground beef, 100% beef, came in at $6.923 a pound, up from $6.885, and a year ago it was $6.318 — 60.5 cents more than last summer, the biggest year-over-year climb on the counter. Ground chuck, the cheaper 100% beef grind, actually fell 7.6 cents in the month to $6.774, but it is still 14.8 cents above last August's $6.626. 34
Bacon ran the opposite way for a year: $6.584 in July to $6.605 in August, and a full 60.3 cents under last August's $7.208. Whole fresh chicken held at $2.012 a pound, 6.4 cents below a year ago, and boneless chicken breast slipped from $4.212 last August to $4.173. 567
The circulars, meanwhile, went shopping for your attention. USDA's weekly grocery feature-activity reports — dated September 25, 2026, covering advertised prices running September 19 to October 1 and gathered from 25,521 store outlets — put beef in 84.7% of circulars, ahead of pork's 82.4% and chicken's 81.6%. And the featured prices ran soft: ground beef in 1–2 pound packs at $5.75, down 75 cents from $6.50 a week earlier; whole bagged fryers at $1.38 a pound, down from $1.70; 1–2 pound sliced bacon at $5.39, down from $5.46. 8910
Eggs, the standing anchor, remain the cheapest story in the store: $2.272 a dozen on the August average, a dollar and thirty-one cents under last August, and just 32.2% of circulars carried them this fortnight. 11 Milk sat at $4.229 a gallon and white bread at $1.823 a pound, both within a few cents of July. 121314
So the verse does the honest thing and the chorus does its usual one. The signs lean down; the year leans up.
Put the counter on while the freezer hums, while you brown a pound of something, or while you weigh whether the family pack is really a saving. Everything here is a national average or an advertised price — not a promise about any one store's shelf.
References
- 1BLS Consumer Price Index, food at home, series CUUR0000SAF11
fred.stlouisfed.org
- 2
- 3BLS average price data, ground beef, 100% beef, series APU0000703112
fred.stlouisfed.org
- 4BLS average price data, ground chuck, 100% beef, series APU0000703111
fred.stlouisfed.org
- 5BLS average price data, bacon, sliced, series APU0000704111
fred.stlouisfed.org
- 6BLS average price data, chicken, fresh, whole, series APU0000706111
fred.stlouisfed.org
- 7BLS average price data, chicken breast, boneless, series APU0000FF1101
fred.stlouisfed.org
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11BLS average price data, eggs, grade A large, series APU0000708111
fred.stlouisfed.org
- 12BLS average price data, whole milk, series APU0000709112
fred.stlouisfed.org
- 13BLS average price data, white bread, series APU0000702111
fred.stlouisfed.org
- 14
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