After a lifetime in the industry, Darius Campeau says today’s soaring prices for meat are reshaping his business, sometimes for the better.
“It’s actually driven more customers to us, because those bargain-basement prices at the grocery store have disappeared,” Campeau said.
Campeau started Ottawa Valley Meats in 2018, but he has worked in the industry for much longer.
The spike in prices is caused primarily because a prolonged drought across North America has led to smaller herds and less available product, Sylvain Charlebois, a professor in food distribution and policy at Dalhousie University, says.
As a result of cost, Canadians are shifting their buying habits and narrowing the gap between butcher shops and big grocery store chains.
The price of meat increased five per cent compared to the same period in 2024, according to a Capital Current analysis of data Statistics Canada uses to track consumer goods and services.
Campeau says the narrowing price gap between butchers and grocery stores has has made it more reasonable for people to turn to independent sellers.
“When all of a sudden ground beef becomes $8 a pound at a grocery store, people start looking for alternatives. … They think maybe $8 will get me something higher quality somewhere else.”
Third-year Carleton University architecture student Jocelyn Leonardy said that shopping for meat is a challenge as a student.
“At this point, I only buy meat if it’s on sale,” she said. “If I wanted to eat ground beef, but chicken was on sale, I would eat chicken.”
Leonardy says she frequently switches between grocery stores like Food Basics, Walmart and Metro for specific kinds of meat. With changes in price, Leonardy said she finds herself constantly looking for the best place to buy meat.
“For whatever reason, the chicken was cheaper at Metro and then at the Walmart at Billings [Bridge], they would always have the cheaper ground beef that they sold in a massive pack,” Leonardy said.
“Meat prices have been a problem for a while now, especially when it comes to beef,” said Charlebois.
“There was a drought that impacted the entire continent,” Charlebois said. “That’s why inventories are extremely low, and it will remain so for the next year or so.”
Charlebois said some producers are choosing to cut the size of their herds instead of absorbing the high cost of feed, which in some cases has to be brought in from far away.
When it comes to what consumers are buying, Charlebois said chicken is flying off store shelves.
“A lot of consumers have pivoted toward chicken, and chicken demand is actually way up,” Charlebois said.
As a Black Friday special, Ottawa Valley Meats was selling ground beef at $7 per pound.
That deal undercut stores such as Walmart and Metro. Walmart’s pound of ground beef was priced at $8.27, while Metro’s was at $8.49, excluding sales.
Although the rising cost of beef has made Campeau’s butcher shop more competitive, he said inflation is a significant challenge for his business.
Campeau said part of the inflation on meat is because of increased costs of feed, shipment and use of American equipment now impacted by tariffs.
“A lot of the machines that you buy for the actual process of the beef are all American-made, or German-made but traded in U.S. dollars,” Campeau said.
With the current conditions, there is no “light at the end of the tunnel,” said Campeau.
For Canadians looking for the best value prices in meat, Campeau suggests buying pork, which has only faced 4.4 per cent inflation compared to the overall meat category’s 8.4 per cent.
Charlebois agreed, saying pork provides the best value right now.
“I never understood why pork is under appreciated, because pork is a good deal right now.”
