If You Love Bacon, You’d Better Start Stocking Up

Bad news, meat lovers. 

Your bacon is about to get way more expensive.

The price of pork bellies—you know, those juicy, succulent morsels used to make the bacon strips we love so dearly—has jumped 174% since dropping to a five-year low back in April, according to Bloomberg. Rising costs of pork bellies mean less bacon in your favorite restaurants and wholesalers—and that means less bacon in your stomach.

What’s behind this sudden spike in prices? After all, bacon prices were fairly low as recently as July, when a one-pound package of bacon was 25% cheaper than they were in July 2014.

There are a few random factors: Quartz notes that higher feed and fuel costs for the raising those adorable, delicious little piglets increased in 2012 and 2013, and an outbreak of swine flu wiped out millions of piggies in 2014.

But the cause of your expensive bacon is, well, the fact that Americans just fucking love bacon. Even without supply-decimating outbreaks and rising prices, America’s growing demand for all things crispy and pork is sending prices through the roof: According to CNN, Americans ate more than 1.1 billion servings of bacon at restaurants around the country in 2014.

“Bacon-centric food items are fueling sales at Wendy’s, which added bacon fries, and McDonald’s, with its sausage and bacon breakfast sandwich,” notes Bloomberg. “Other culinary wonders include the bacon veggie burger.”

Why one would even bother with a bacon veggie burger is beyond me. But if you’re as obsessed with bacon as your fellow citizens are, beware: You may want to stock up now, or face some pain in your wallet in the coming years.

Photos by Getty Images