David Deeley, Consumer and Market Insight Team, Bord Bia – Irish Food Board
The latest research from The Thinking House highlights consumer attitudes towards cooking, shopping and eating habits across 8 markets including Ireland and Great Britain, four Continental European markets, as well as the US and China.
Since 2001, Bord Bia’s PERIscope, the largest quantitative study of its kind in Ireland, has been exploring consumer attitudes towards topics such as eating at home, cooking, local food, the environment, and health and well-being.
Below is a just a taste of the information available:
- Health and Wellbeing continue to be a major trend across each of the eight markets. Irish people have a very positive perception of their own health, with 88% recognising that it is important to eat well and acknowledging a link between diet and mental well-being
- Only 3 in 10 people in the Republic of Ireland are confident that they could produce a Sunday roast, yet cooking from scratch is showing growth over time, rising from 46% in 2005 to 69% today.
- Three-quarters of consumers in the Republic of Ireland eat their main meal in the kitchen in comparison to 57% of those in Britain, who claim to eat in the living room/lounge.
- The results in relation to value and price sensitivity suggest a softening of the desire to focus on price since the height of the recession. Price is back at 2005 level with 52% of those in the Republic of Ireland saying the first thing they look at is price (this was at 60% in 2015).
- Checking for the country of origin (78%) and quality symbols (75% up by 20% since 2001) continue to be important for consumers in the Republic of Ireland.
- Irish people are also embracing all things green and becoming more conscious of environmental issues, with figures who agree having increased to 61% from 56% in 2007. We also see that one in two of us are concerned about the amount of food we throw away.
Want to find out more? Visit www.BordBia.ie/PERIscope2017 to access the full reports and country summaries or contact TheThinkingHouse@BordBia.ie
(The research took place between March and April 2017 and included over 8,000 interviews in total.)
