One of California's top egg producers exposed.

In 2005, following a Farm Sanctuary exposé of Gemperle Farms, one of California's largest egg producers with over 2 million hens, Trader Joe's agreed to limit its sales of eggs from caged hens. The 2005 footage revealed horrific conditions in which hens are packed into dilapidated wire cages, suffering and dying amid filth.

In early 2007, Farm Sanctuary received more footage from Gemperle Farms' battery-cage facilities showing identical conditions. Although Trader Joe’s subsequently stopped selling eggs from Gemperle Farms, major supermarkets all over the West, including Safeway, Albertson's and others continue to purchase eggs from Gemperle Farms. And Trader Joe’s continues to sell battery-cage eggs from only the nation’s largest industrialized factory egg farms, where conditions are inherently horrific.

Click here to see a copy of the letter from Farm Sanctuary to law enforcement authorities.

Although Farm Sanctuary's exposés of Gemperle Farms show horrifying conditions, the unfortunate fact is that they are par for the course in egg factory farms all over the U.S. Further, they demonstrate clearly the reasons that over 7 million Californians voted to pass the Prevention of Farm Animal Cruelty Act on November 4, 2008, to prohibit the use of battery cages in the state, effective in 2015.