PETA Urges the Sydney Roosters to Drop Steggles Sponsorship After Cruelty Exposé

Posted on by Laura Weyman-Jones

After horrendous cruelty was exposed at Baiada, which produces Steggles chicken, PETA wrote to the Sydney Roosters, asking the team to drop the brand as a sponsor.

Clearly, the sponsorship serves as one giant ad for the Steggles brand. But what exactly is being advertised? Check out the video below for a glimpse behind the scenes at the breeding facility and abattoir producing Steggles’ meat:


The investigation shows workers picking up chickens and beating them against a metal rail and other hard surfaces. Some birds were slammed against the rail as many as seven times. Most of the blows were so hard that the eyewitness, who stood up to 4 metres away, could hear the impact through earplugs or headphones and over the noise of the plant machinery.

Workers can also be seen punching shackled birds in the head, and one threw a single chicken into the shackles 12 times. The eyewitness also documented that chickens were thrown up to 4 metres and that two workers tore the heads off fully conscious chickens.

In all, the eyewitness documented the egregious abuse of chickens by at least 21 workers. Some of these incidents occurred just a few metres from CCTV cameras that, according to workers, are monitored only intermittently by management.

During the investigation, Baiada was notified of the abuse, but afterwards, the eyewitness neither saw any change in workers’ behaviour nor heard anything from management.

Surely, the Sydney Roosters don’t want to be associated with this litany of cruelty. PETA is asking the team to take a meaningful stance for the gentle, intelligent birds that grace its uniforms.

If you haven’t already, please share this investigation with your friends and family. Chickens’ lives depend on it.