Evolutionary aspects of coffee consumers’ buying habits: Results of a sample survey

Coffee is the second marketed product on a worldwide level, after petroleum, with a market volume equal to around 15 billion dollars. Today it represents the only real source of income for more than 20 million farmers in the South of the world. More than 25 million people perform their professional activity in the fi eld of coffee cultivation, trade and processing. For many developing countries, coffee exports are an essential source for the growth of their economies. For these reasons, the international coffee culture has turned a commodity into a mass phenomenon. In Italy, coffee is a product consumed in large quantities and ranks 10th worldwide in terms of per capita consumption. The present survey aims at studying and investigating the identity, cultural and socio-economic aspects linked to the consumption of coffee in Italy. Therefore, the research object is to investigate whether the act of consuming coffee is not only connected with the satisfaction of basic needs, but if it implies a series of aspects linked to the individual’s culture and identity, without forgetting the economic variables that the consumer must take into account at the time of purchase.