A spot check of grocery prices in 39 states found that the ingredients for a traditional Thanksgiving meal will cost 1.5-percent less than last year, and, at $49.12 for a dinner for 10, are the lowest since 2013, said the American Farm Bureau Federation. The biggest item for the meal, in weight and dollars — 16-pound turkey — costs $1.40 a pound, or 1.4-percent less than last year.
“For the second consecutive year, the overall cost of Thanksgiving dinner has declined,” said AFBF economist John Newton. “The cost of the dinner is the lowest since 2013 and second-lowest since 2011.” Declining in price from 2016 were turkey, milk, rolls, pie shells, sweet potatoes, green peas, coffee, butter, eggs, sugar and flour.
Some 141 volunteer shoppers checked grocery prices for the AFBF survey, which began in 1986. While the informal survey found lower prices for Thanksgiving food, the government says the year-on-year decline in grocery prices will not be as large. It forecasts a 0.5-percent decline in supermarket prices in 2017, the second year in a row for deflation. Ordinarily, grocery prices rise 2.2 percent a year.