TELL ME WHAT YOU EAT, I TELL YOU WHAT YOU ARE
Italians are increasingly looking for healthy, organic and high quality food
Organic and healthy food, quality in ingredients, superfood. This is the picture of the Italians’ shopping cart from COOP 2017 report. During the first six months of the year, families’ consumption styles confirm some trend of the last years. Compared to 2010, the luxury products’ consumption grows of 8%, in terms of the choice of more expensive products (as fish filets, coffee capsules or wines and spumante), but also of preference for the “made in Italy” products and the ones certified Dop, Doc and Igp. Still grows the research of unusual tastes and practicality in kitchen: +6,9% for ethnic foods and prepared dishes. It is also confirmed the greater trend to wellness: +5% compared to 2010, with a strong increment in the last two years. In this regard, there is an interesting tendency to replace some products with their healthier variant: instead of the eggs from battery hens, Italians prefer to buy free-range eggs, as well as instead of biscuits and snacks they prefer toasted bread, low-fat yogurt and products rich in fiber. Increasingly, the healthiness of a food matters as a criterion of propensity to purchase: one Italian out of two considers it one of the first three criteria to choose which foods buy, even before the cheapness or the organoleptic properties of the product. Follows this health trend the success of organic products, chosen by 40% of Italian consumers (first place among European consumers), with the creation of a turnover of almost one and a half billion euros only in the first months of the year. Italians are also the first in Europe for research of quality products, with 69% saying they are willing to pay more for a better quality product. Follow the Germans with a 61%, Spain and the United Kingdom both with a 59% and France, in which only one consumer in two is willing to do the same. Finally, Italians are oriented towards therapeutic foods, in particular they choose superfoods. Italy in fact ranks first in all of Europe for the consumption of goji berries, while avocados, ginger and quinoa, superfoods already introduced in eating habits, record an exponential growth compared to the previous year (+ 80% ginger, + 70% avocado and + 40% quinoa). Therefore, the tendency to express one's own individuality through food choices appears to be more and more widespread. Even more, diet consumptions becomes the new indicators of our social and cultural status: food is the current status symbol, or even the new luxury frontier.