Meaningful Milestones: Our Impact Timeline

Because of persistent pressure from Mercy For Animals supporters, retail giant Ahold Delhaize—the parent company of grocery chains like Food Lion, Stop & Shop, and Hannaford—has agreed to a new roadmap to eliminate cages from its egg supply chain in the United States. After nearly a decade of vague commitments and a delayed timeline, the company has now committed to clear two-year benchmarks and annual progress reporting toward its cage-free goal. In addition, by the end of 2026, cage-free labeling will appear across more than 2,000 stores, increasing accountability for the company’s transition away from cages.

This progress follows sustained advocacy from Mercy For Animals supporters and coalition partners who demanded action. Together, we delivered thousands of petition signatures to Hannaford’s headquarters, organized multiple demonstrations, deployed creative tactics like temporary chalk stencils, flooded their social media pages, and caught the attention of important media outlets.

When fully implemented, this policy will help ensure that millions of hens are no longer confined to battery cages.

Lagardère Travel Retail, a global travel retail company, has fully met its global cage-free egg commitment across all markets by the end of 2025, achieving 100% cage-free sourcing worldwide—including in Asia—through a combination of physical cage-free eggs and cage-free credits.

Since 2022, Mercy For Animals has engaged with Lagardère Travel Retail on the company’s progress.

PepsiCo’s corporate cafeteria in its Mexico City office successfully launched its new vegan menu on January 26 following months of close collaboration with our team. Each day the cafeteria will offer a rotating 3-course plant-based meal.

This launch marks an exciting first step. We’re continuing to partner with the culinary and service teams by offering tailored recipes, sourcing recommendations, and hands-on training for cafeteria staff to ensure long-term success.

By building strong internal capacity and demonstrating what’s possible at the corporate level, this partnership positions PepsiCo to achieve meaningful results—and opens the door to expanding plant-based menu offerings across additional client locations.

The state of Nagaland announced a ban on swill feeding — the practice of feeding pigs food waste — marking another important policy win for farmed animals in India. The decision reflects growing recognition among state governments of the risks swill feeding poses to animal health, food safety, and disease control. Mercy For Animals continues to support policy efforts that end the worst farming practices across the country.

Following years of engagement and accountability efforts by Mercy For Animals, Dairy Queen has successfully fulfilled its cage-free egg commitment across the U.S. and Canada—ahead of its original deadline.

The commitment required all suppliers of shell eggs, liquid eggs, and proprietary ingredients to transition to cage-free systems. As a result of this progress, 100% of eggs used in Dairy Queen’s U.S. and Canadian operations are now cage-free, or the ingredients have been reformulated to remove eggs altogether.

Beyond North America, Dairy Queen reports that 99% of egg use across its international operations is cage-free. The company is currently working with a remaining supplier in one region to transition a proprietary sauce ingredient to cage-free eggs, which will complete the commitment globally.

Our team kept the pressure on Dairy Queen by featuring them multiple times in our Canada Animal Welfare Scorecard.