Right now, a limited cattle supply across the country has left local restaurants and grocery shoppers feeling the impacts of the rising cost of beef.
“Everything has gone up, including the beef. It has gone up quite a bit,” said Orcutt resident, Debra Collingwood.
“Well, I don’t buy beef very often because you don’t need a lot of red meat,” added Juliana Colegrove, who also lives in Orcutt. “But when I do, I look at prices and try to get the best quality for the best price. That is getting harder to do.”
According to the US Department of Agriculture, retail beef prices are currently at a record high of around $8 per pound, up nearly a dollar from its lowest average cost last year, and roughly 60% more expensive than a decade ago.
“I look at the prices and try to pick the package with the cheaper price and lower weight,” Colegrove told KSBY.
Meanwhile, just southeast of Orcutt in Casmalia, a longstanding steakhouse has seen its expenses grow as well.
“We have seen beef prices go up about 20% in the last couple of years, and that is due to a lot of reasons,” said Terri Stricklin, general manager of the Hitching Post.
Stricklin says her restaurant gets its supply of cattle from the Midwest, where according to a livestock report from the USDA, beef production is expected to decline by $180 million pounds through the end of the year.
As a result, Stricklin says this past year, menu prices at the Hitching Post have gone up.
“The meat industry hasn’t bounced back from the shutdowns during COVID. There are still about 25% short on their labor, so everything costs more,” Stricklin said.
She says a steak dinner at The Hitching Post will cost you about $10 more than it did last year, and amid a time of inflated costs, Collingwood says she has become more selective about when she eats out.
“I used to go out probably a couple times a week; now, I go out once every couple weeks because the prices are so high,” she admitted.
Terri Stricklin adds that despite the growing expenses, her restaurant only raises menu prices when it is absolutely necessary.
“We will keep going. We will be here another 100 years, God willing. We won’t change our quality because of prices. Our customers know, we will pay more if that is what it takes,” she said.
Experts say the dry weather has also limited the production of hay, leaving some nationwide farmers unable to feed their cattle.
We also tried reaching out to local cattle ranchers to weigh in on what they are seeing, but they were unavailable for comment.
