At last reversing a three-year trend, food sales-volumes in Italy are growing once again.
Coldiretti, the country's agricultural body, say that its members can thank low-cost shopping for the encouraging statistics of 2014 trading.
La Repubblica sums up the trend by writing Agli italiani è tornata la voglia di mangiare – "Among Italians, the desire to eat has returned." The Milan daily states that though the growth is small per se (0.1 per cent), it is highly auspicious as it indicates the possibility that more prosperous times are ahead.
Research carried out by the Istituto Nazionale di Statistica (Istat) shows that FMCG sales for November were up by 0.1 per cent on October. The strong significance of this lies in the fact that it ends a considerable period of shrinkage.
Partially because of inflation, sales volumes in the country's largest retailers dropped by one per cent, while smaller discount foodstores have eaten up the floating shoppers. It was the success of smaller-scale hard-discount shopping that facilitated the good year for Coldiretti, which represents the vast majority of the country's farmers and food-makers (of all varieties).
The question which remains is that of how those retailers in grande distribuzione organizzata can capitalise on the new willingness of the Italian population to buy greater quantities food: a new phase of the price war is likely to ensue.
© 2014 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article written by Peter Donnelly
