WASHINGTON – The Nov. 22 issue of the National Chicken Council’s Washington Report relays that in 2009 US chicken marketed by processors in an ice-packed form accounted for 35.6% of total marketings, according to the Broiler Industry Marketing Survey Report for 2009 issued by the NCC earlier this week. This compares with 35.1% reported for 2007 and 34.4% for 2005. For 2009, pre-packed, fresh/refrigerated, chicken accounted for 16.9%, up from 15.4% in 2007 and also up from the 16.4% in 2005.

“Frozen, unprepared,” the third major marketing-form category in the study, represented 22.6% of total marketings last year. This share compared with 22.9% in 2007 and 21.5% in 2005.


Regarding marketing channels, distributors continued to handle a substantial share of total chicken marketings in 2009, the NCC survey of processors found. Processors shipped 28.5% of their marketings to distributors last year, the largest marketing channel category and the same percentage as in 2007. In 2005, the comparable share was 26.5%. Retail grocery stores, including club stores, was the second-largest marketing channel with 26.6% compared with 25.3% and 25.5%, respectively for 2007 and 2005.

Participating in the survey for 2009 were 22 broiler processors that represent 82% of production. These processors marketed approximately 7 billion broilers weighing 30.8 billion lbs., ready-to-cook weight. They operated 120 processing plants and 50 further-processing plants.