Not really sure what is going on with vanilla, but it is super expensive everywhere. I just did one vanilla brew and am about to add vanilla to another this week and have a heafty amount of cash tied up just in vanilla beans. I spend days looking for it online and in grocery stores, specialty stores, spice shops, and homebrew shops and everyone had high prices for it.
I found the best deal on amazon. Gourmet Tahitian Vanilla Beans (10 beans) for $28 ASIN: B01CTSU5BE They were really good beans. super fragrant and moist. I use 5 beans split and scraped in each one of my brews and the one that is finished came out amazing.