A glut of cheap eggs will flood on to the market this Easter because of the demise of Woolworths, retailers and wholesalers have predicted.

Tesco this week snapped up container loads of Easter eggs destined for the now-defunct chain, which sold 20 million Easter eggs a year. The retailer has already promised to sell a gift pack that would have been sold in Woolworths for £4.99, for £2.49.

The multiples are fighting it out to become the biggest Easter egg retailer following the demise of Woolies, which was the market leader.

Independents said cheaper deals threatened to push them out of the Easter egg market completely. The multiples’ traditionally aggressive Easter egg promotions would become even more intense, they predicted. The problem would be exacerbated by shoppers cutting down on their spending during the recession and Easter falling later than usual this year, on 12 April.

Although Easter is seven weeks away, promotions on eggs have already started, including bogof deals at The Co-operative and three-for-£2.50 deals at Tesco.

“Easter eggs are clearly going to be very cheap - Asda is already selling them for £1,” said one retailer.

One independent said he would cut back his Easter egg range by 25% this year because he could not compete with the multiples. “I’ll be buying mine from supermarkets.”

Despite the deals, the multiples would be desperate to avoid excess stock, said one wholesaler. “I’m not aware of manufacturers offloading cheaper stock yet, but into March we could see massive deals.”

Tesco is not the only retailer to have picked up Woolies eggs. 99p Stores has been shopping too.

“The manufacturer could stop production of some products but the components for other products had already been ordered, so we bought 150,000 medium and large eggs,” confirmed commercial director Hussein Lalani.

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