ATLANTA — Beef prices hit historic highs as the total U.S. beef cattle population dipped to its smallest size in decades. Despite the surge, consumers are sticking with beef, even if it means a hit to their wallet.
At Che Butter Jonez in Brookhaven, a burger could cost between $16 and $22, and soon some items might see another 47-cent bump.
Chef Malik Rhasaan told Channel 2’s Candace McCowan he’s been avoiding driving prices too high.
“My process is pretty simple: heat, fire and salt and pepper,” said Rhasaan. “We don’t feed TikTok-ers. It tastes like your mom made it.”
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So far, his customers are still coming through the door.
“It slows you down a little bit,” said one of his customers Neal Andrews. “But you got to eat. I might do one or two a week.”
According to a USDA report, Andrews is like millions of Americans who consumed about a pound of beef per week in 2024. Whether it’s at Rhasaan’s restaurant or mom’s cooking at home, there’s no avoiding the high costs of beef.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the price of ground beef is up nearly 13%, and steaks are up 16.6%.
University of Georgia beef economist Will Secor says for the most part, today’s prices come down to supply and demand.
“It’s going to be a while before we see these beef prices start to come down,” Secor said. “Probably a year or two years.”
That is due in large part to a dwindling population of beef cattle in the United States.
At the start of 2025, U.S. farms and ranches held 86.7 million cattle, down half a million from the same time in 2024, according to USDA data.
To begin increasing the size of the US herd, farmers would need to make choices today that won’t be felt for at least a year. That timeframe is tied to when calves born this year will be big enough to send to market.
But according to a market report from the American Farm Bureau Federation, fewer calves were born in 2025 than in any year on record.
All in all, beef prices could get higher before they stabilize.
“As we always say, high prices cure high prices,” Secor said. “Once we see those high prices, it’s an incentive for those in the supply chain to try and find a way to increase production.”
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In the field, one operation in Morgan County east of Atlanta is trying to seize the market conditions
“We’ve been on a meteoric rise over the last several years of increasing beef and cattle prices,” said Brian Lance, owner of Iron Will Cattle near Madison, Georgia. “The farmers are using this as an opportunity to turn their cattle into cash as they’ve increased in value.”
Lance and his wife Jessica raise a herd of Red Angus cattle that had their genes specially selected through in-vitro fertilization.
It took them years of gaining experience and careful planning before they got into the market in 2019. Now, they’re pushing to seize the moment with the herd they worked to build.
To explain why it’s become more expensive to raise cattle, Lance nodded to equipment and labor costs, insurance rates and pressure on land availability from urban development.
“Everything is piling into everything,” Lance said.
New houses have gone up across the road from one of his pastures since their operation began in 2019. Before then, Georgia’s agricultural land was already declining, with Georgia Conservancy estimating that 20% of farmland was lost between 1974 and 2016.
Secor said land is yet another limiting factor on how fast farmers and ranchers can grow their herds.
“On the constraint side, do they have access to land?” Secor asked. “If they’re already maxed out on their capacity on the land they have, do they have an opportunity to expand or not? They need to look at of these other opportunities and avenues to increase their revenue.”
And further down the supply chain, Rhasaan and his wife at Che Butter Jonez are looking for their own pathways to revenue.
“I’ll get a job at the airport first before I gouge prices,” Rhasaan said. “We’re about customers, we’re about good food and providing a good product. We’ll figure it out.”
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