by Meg Perry

Everyone is talking about why egg prices are so high, but there is a more important egg that has
skyrocketed in price: the Cadbury egg.

My mother and I were making a routine trip to Walgreens yesterday. Essential items were
needed: Cadbury eggs, Tylenol, and toilet paper. My mother is a legendary consumer of Cadbury
eggs. If there were a Hall of Fame for Cadbury enthusiasts, her face would be on the plaque,
mid-bite, eyes closed in pure bliss.

There were the brilliant little eggs with their crunchy outer shells and milk chocolate fillings
where they belong, in the Easter aisle.

“I need my Cads,” my mother had told me early that morning. “My time with them is limited.”

This was not a metaphor for mortality—she meant the eggs. These eggs of joy emerge but once a year, so there is a sense of urgency to secure them before they are gone, before she is left in the cold, eggless abyss of the off-season. My mother, no doubt, eats more Cadbury eggs each year than chicken eggs.

When visiting my mother this time of year, it is typical to hear, “Meg, I need some Cads,” if I so
much as shift in my seat, as if any movement at all suggests I am en route to the kitchen. And so
begins the ritual. Never accepting the entire bag at once, she forces me into an elaborate game of
chocolate rationing. I must make multiple trips from the kitchen to the chair, like a medieval
squire delivering golden treasures to the queen, filling her palms with her favorite treat and main
form of sustenance this time of year.

A ritual—sacred, and increasingly expensive.

At our local Walgreens, these precious eggs were listed, on sale, for $6.00 per bag. On sale. That was the discounted price.

My mother and I are not cheap people. Not that we have money, but we like to spend it like we do. That is why I write in outrage: Why are Cadbury eggs so expensive?

Just the previous day, we were at a gas station, and my mother grabbed a mini bag of Cadbury eggs—no more than ten eggs within.

“Three dollars!” my mother shouted. “For that little bag!”

I joined in. “Highway robbery!”

We left the mini bag in protest, our dignity intact. We did, however, buy the larger $6.00 bag at
Walgreens. Some causes are worth fighting for; others are worth paying $6.00 for. It was, after all, a
necessity.

Google’s ever-helpful AI overview informed me that “due to a combination of factors including
their seasonal nature, the complex production process needed to create their distinct shape and
texture, rising costs of key ingredients like cocoa and dairy, and the high demand concentrated
around Easter time, leading to a supply and demand dynamic where consumers are willing to
pay more for a limited-time treat.”

First of all, how complex is the production process of an egg shape? What are they doing back
there? Hand-carving each one with a tiny chisel? Whispering sweet nothings to the chocolate
before it’s molded? Infusing them with liquid gold? Are Swiss chocolatiers hand-massaging each
one before packaging?

What if one day, this so-called “supply and demand dynamic” gets so out of hand that they
vanish from the shelves entirely? Will people start making DIY versions in their basements,
whispering “it’s not the same” as they take a bite? Will there be an underground Cadbury ring,
where desperate consumers barter away family heirlooms for a single egg? Will my mother have
to ration her supply like an old-timey prospector hoarding gold nuggets, measuring out chocolate
pieces with a scale? It is a chilling possibility.

On the drive home from Walgreens, my mother sat in the passenger seat, a fresh bag of Cadbury
eggs on her lap. She let out a sigh, equal parts relief and dread.

“The real egg crisis,” she sighed, cradling the bag, “is the Cadbury egg crisis.”

And she’s right.

Meg Perry is a Rackham Merit Fellow, a Doctoral Student in the Joint Program in English & Education and a Graduate Student Instructor, in the English Department Writing Program at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor