At Sprouts we believe that bettering animal welfare is a part of good business. We recognize our responsibility to ensure the welfare of farm animals throughout our supply chain with respect to their physical, behavioral, and mental well-being. We are working to establish and implement meaningful animal welfare standards across our meat supply chain. As part of this process, aimed to improve animal welfare, we are engaging our suppliers, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and other relevant stakeholders to ensure our policies and targets for continuous improvement are progressive, meaningful, and help drive the industry forward.

Chicken Welfare

We’ve made progress within our chicken supply chain to improve the lives of millions of chickens on farm and have created a roadmap for continuous improvement. Our goals to improve chicken welfare are aligned with components of the Better Chicken Commitment (BCC).

We are committed to improving chicken welfare through the implementation of environmental enrichments by the end of 2024, reduced stocking density by the end of 2025, and more humane processing through controlled atmosphere stunning by the end of 2026. We also recognize the welfare issues experienced by conventional breeds of chickens raised for meat production and will continue to look for opportunities to expand offerings of these products.

Goals & Progress

Pork Welfare

Most conventionally raised pigs for meat consumption are raised with the use of gestation crates that significantly limit the sow’s ability to move or exhibit natural behaviors. We have set a goal to source 75% of whole and processed pork sold in our meat department from group-housed or gestation-crate free housing systems by the end of 2024 and reach 100% by the end of 2025. Moving to a gestation crate free supply over time is our ultimate goal.

In 2023, 63% of our whole and processed pork sold was from group-housed or gestation-crate free systems (45% and 18% respectively), while 100% of our Sprouts Brand whole pork product was sourced from group-housed systems. We will continue to provide annual updates on our progress in this area on our website and/or annual Impact Report.

Laying Hens

Improving the lives of laying hens on farm is a top priority for Sprouts. 100% of our eggs are sourced from cage free, organic, free-range, or pasture-raised production systems. Our goal is to continue expanding our sourcing from higher welfare free-range and pasture-raised egg production systems.