https://www.foodandwine.com/are-vital-farms-eggs-ethical-8723788 They got sued for false advertisement and a rundown on food and wine tells the details but tldr: they didnt lose the lawsuit and the settlement with PETA was about conduct by the lawyers not the farmers. That said almost all egg farming cannot be particularly humane since it starts with putting all male chicks into a shredder alive.

Edit: they are “certified humane, pasture raised” which enforces minimum outside time and addresses a lot of the concerns that turned me off back when I stopped.

Old text that isn’t true for vital farms here:

!This brand is at minimum “certified humane”, which carries some actual requirements they must meet, which includes at least X square feet of outdoor space available to each chicken, which is a measurable thing. However, as the article points out, there’s no required amount of time the chickens spend there, so that space could be “available” to them in the same way that the grand canyon is “available” to all people in America. It might not be feasible to get there, and there’s no required minimum indoor space so it could be 100million chickens in a shed with a single doggy door that connects via tunnel to a cattle ranch next door. Technically available but designed to minimize use.

I used to pay the premium for these and… pete gerties(? I think) but learning how little was enforcably being done for how much extra i was paying made me jaded and i slowly phased eggs out of my home diet. Decide for yourself. Certified humane is better than not Certified humane, and almost all the rest of the labels mean nothing and are not checked or enforced by any third party.!<