The True Cost of Meat

Not all meat is created equal.

We often get the question, "why are your products so expensive?" The truth is we really aren't, we're priced how meat that is properly raised ought to be priced.  The true question is, "why is cheap meat so cheap?"

A few reasons why we're priced the way we are:

• Grass-fed meat and pasture poultry take 2-3 times longer to grow than industrial meat - including industrial organic.
• 99% of the poultry raised in the US is raised in confinement. This includes industrial organic and even free-range poultry.
  
• Grass-fed meat is more humane because it allows the animals to live the lives they were meant to live rather than being crowded in medieval cow cities (feed lots or CAFOs).
  
• Q: Who has a smaller carbon footprint? a) a vegetarian who drives a hummer b) a conventional meat eater who drives a prius?
  A: a) The vegetarian because conventional grain-fed meat consumes so much fossil fuel. By eating grass-fed meat you are eating meat that only requires the sun and rain to grow grass. So you would in effect be the vegetarian in this scenario.
  

• Conventional meat is so highly subsidized from multiple angles (both in its inputs and outputs) that its true price is several times higher than its cost at the grocery store. KOL Foods meat is not government subsidized - there are no externalities - so what you are paying for is its true cost. KOL Foods meat is not expensive, rather it is priced according to its true cost.
• These subsidies are putting farmers out of work in developing countries including South/Central America; partially resulting in the huge increase in illegal immigration to the USA.
• Fast food hamburger meat can be as cheap as $0.80/lb but if society incorporated all the externalities into the cost (human heath, animal health, pollution, etc) this $0.80/lb hamburger would actually cost somewhere around $200/lb. KOL Foods ground beef is way cheaper than that!
• Grass-fed meat is much better for the environment because it uses a lot less fossil fuel and has no industrial (sewage) run-off/pollution.
• Medieval livestock cities (feed lots or CAFOs) are breeding grounds for antibiotic resistant diseases and produce more sewage than many human towns of the same population.  In most states CAFOs are regulated the same way small farms are rather than as factories or sewage plants so they are unregulated when it comes to dumping raw sewage.