Abstract
Consumers are influenced by a multitude of stimuli, which affect their behaviour and guide their pref-erences towards a particular product. Ethnocentric tendencies are one of these stimuli, understood as consumers’ positive attitudes towards goods produced in their own region rather than those from other regions. From this perspective, the current study describes ethnocentric tendencies and identifies olive oil consumer preferences from Lisbon (Portugal). CETSCALE and the conjoint analysis technique have been used for this purpose. Results show that Portuguese olive oil consumers exhibit a strong ethnocentric ten-dency but the price attribute is also key. Nonetheless, there exists a less ethnocentric segment, on which foreign business strategy can be focused. On this segment, consumers attach lower relative importance to the price and higher relative importance to differentiated-quality parameters: oil type (extra virgin), bottle (glass) and production system (organic).
Highlights
Given their agro-climatic conditions, the countries around the Mediterranean basin form the centre of world olive oil production, accounting for three-quarters of global olive oil production
Consumers from Lisbon exhibited a clear ethnocentric behaviour regarding products made in their country, since the values obtained
Consumers were segmented as a function of the sample median, identifying the most and the least ethnocentric consumers in Lisbon city with a maximum level of error of 1% (Table 4)
Summary
Given their agro-climatic conditions, the countries around the Mediterranean basin form the centre of world olive oil production, accounting for three-quarters of global olive oil production. The mean olive oil production from 2001 to 2014 was 2,830,000 t, of which 42% corresponded to Spain, 19% to Italy, and 12% to Greece, these three countries being the main producers. The Mediterranean olive oil producing countries account for 75% of consumption. The main producers, Italy, Spain and Greece, consume 25.4%, 19.9% and 8.7% respectively. Per capita consumption is 15.5 kg/year in Greece, 11.4 kg/year in Spain, 10.3 kg/year in Italy and 7.1 kg/year in Portugal (IOC, 2015). Olive oil consumption is limited to this production area. There is a growing worldwide trend associated with the benefits of the Mediterranean diet, of which olive oil is an essential part
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