Cash-strapped Melburnians ditching steak for snags as meat prices soar

Steak and chicken breasts are being swapped for snags and burgers at many family dinner tables, as meat prices keep rising across Melbourne.

Jen Kelly

2 min read

June 10, 2023 - 7:00AM

Brendan Watts said the wholesale price of some meat cuts had surged almost 100 per cent in a year.

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Meat prices have skyrocketed in the past year, forcing cash-strapped families to give up steaks in favour of snags and burgers.

One typical Melbourne butcher has hiked the price of beef mince, a popular staple, by more than 60 per cent in a year.

Rising costs of fuel, power, insurance and labour have caused meat production costs to soar, according to industry experts.

Doncaster East butcher Brendon Watts said the wholesale price he paid for some meat cuts had surged almost 100 per cent in a year, and the costs of doing business had soared.

“We have absorbed most of that. Now we can’t – there is nowhere to go,” Mr Watts, of Brendon’s Quality Meats, said.

Mr Watts said he had to raise the price of premium beef mince from $16 a kilo a year ago to $26 a kilo now – a 62.5 per cent rise – and accept much lower profit margins.

“The cost for me to buy that has gone up 100 per cent in 12 months, so I should be charging $32,” he said.

In the past year, Mr Watts’ free-range chicken breast fillets have jumped from $18 to $25 a kilo, eye fillet from $80 to $100 a kilo and aged scotch fillet from $59 to $79 a kilo.

“The demand for chicken breast fillets has fallen through the floor,” he said. “We would be selling 50 per cent less easily.”

Steak is off the menu at many tables across Melbourne, as cost of living pressures bite.

Mr Watts’ sales of beef mince have plummeted about 30 per cent in a year, but mince remains a top seller, along with burgers and snags.

“Mince is considered the most economical, value-for-money product that delivers everything that people want,” he said.

Mr Watts said truck driver shortages, abattoir staff shortages and rocketing prices for fuel, power and fertiliser were contributing to higher prices for his customers.

“We are one of the most expensive countries in the world to produce anything,” Mr Watts said.

“Everyone’s costs in business have gone up 30 per cent in two years.”

Nationally, the picture is not quite as grim.

Customers are paying 10.5 per cent more for chicken than a year ago, according to NielsenIQ retail figures from Meat & Livestock Australia.

Seafood sales have fallen 12.1 per cent in a year, while prices rose 8.9 per cent.

Some beef products have risen up to 11.3 per cent in price, leading to a 7.3 per cent drop in overall beef sales.

T-bone steak sales plunged a whopping 30 per cent.

Australian Meat Industry Council general manager for industry affairs Tim Ryan said cattle and sheep prices had declined modestly in recent months, but other costs continue to climb.

“Major costs such as labour, energy, finance and insurance have all increased dramatically, and Australia was already an expensive place to do business compared to our global peers,” he said.

Farmers are feeling the pinch of cheaper livestock prices, with saleyard rates for some cattle half of what they were this time last year.

Beef’s benchmark Eastern Young Cattle Indicator has slipped 10 per cent in the past month and finished this week at 562c/kg carcass weight – down 50 per cent on 12 months ago.

The industry’s trade lamb indicator improved last week but is tracking 27 per cent down on this time last year.