Here are some questions I would ask before I bought eggs from a particular breeder:
1) Where did you get your (breed name) from?
2) How long have you been breeding them?
3) Can you tell me a little bit about your breeding program? For example, what does it consist of? How do you go about it? What, if anything, are your goals and what are you striving for?
4) Have you shown your birds, and if so, how have they done? Do you know if any of your egg customers have ever shown their birds, if so, have they ever won anything?
5) Can you provide a close up picture(s) of the parents and can you provide a close up picture(s) of a representative egg?
6) Have you experienced any problems with Mareks, Lymphoid Leucosis (LL), Newcastle’s, MG (in particular), or any other disease that could be transmitted through the egg or genetics? I got a rooster many years ago that died from LL less than two weeks after I bought him. Evidently there is no prevention nor cure for LL but rather it is something passed down from the mother to the progeny and the best prevention is having bred resistance to the disease. The incubation period for LL is 6-10 months so it would be some time before I would find out if I have a problem. That’s why I ask.
7) Do you offer any kind of guarantee regarding fertility and/or the packaging so eggs arrive intact?
8) Do your hens all lay the (specific color) eggs that are relatively the same in color?
9) When collecting hatching eggs for sale, do you identify each egg from a particular set of parents or just collect as a group?
10) Is there anything else you can tell me that maybe I should know or should’ve asked