The revolution in wine consumption patterns in Italy continues: more occasional (at 60 percent), more women, greater awareness. Increasing “cheating” with other drinks.
UIV elaborations based on Istat for the past 12 years.
In 2023, 29.4 million wine consumers in our country are confirmed to be stable compared to the previous year. So too is the overall population penetration rate (55 percent), while daily consumers drop to 11.7 million, 400,000 fewer than in 2022. This is the snapshot prepared by the Italian Wine Union (UIV) Observatory based on Istat, which released the 2023 tables on Italians’ alcohol consumption. The balance consumed in Italy in 2023 is estimated by the Observatory to be 23 million hectoliters.
Changing habits
The picture that emerges from the Uiv survey of changes in the scenario over the past 12 years is one of a population that generally does not give up wine (+2% the number of wine drinkers compared to 2011), although with profound signs of changing habits. Represented 58 percent by males and 42 percent by females, the new wine consumers and – increasingly – female consumers in fact have a more responsible and conscious, but at the same time less exclusive relationship with wine, made up of frequent betrayals of habits and flirtations with other alcoholic partners.
This is a trend that with the passing of the years gradually characterizes not only the young and very young, but is now also reflected in the older generations, who are also becoming less and less tied to daily and almost passive companionship employment. Proof of this is, among other things, the significant growth of consumers ataperitifs (up 31 percent since 2011), now a habit for nearly 22 million people.
For the president of UIV, Lamberto Frescobaldi: “New Istat surveys once again confirm the extraordinary relationship of Italians with wine: habits change, but the current approach is probably even more inspiring than the motivations of yesteryear. Today the demand is more about pleasure and sharing than habit, and this I think is an important proof of maturity that confirms how wine is synonymous with moderation“.
Identikit of the Italian winelover
Redrawing the identikit of Italian winelovers is the growth over the period in female demand (+10%, with males at -3%), the lower daily fruition (-22%) and the concomitant 29 percent growth in “non-daily newspapers,” which now number 17.7 million people and account for 60 percent of the total, up from 48 percent 12 years earlier. A phenomenon, that of occasionality, also involves beer: today two-thirds of blonde drinkers do so sporadically.
And if, as is easy to imagine, among daily consumers the young people of Gen X (up to 24 years old) weigh only 4.4 percent (about half of their incidence on the Italian population), the fast and gradual erosion of the “assiduous” among the following generations is surprising. Indeed, trends for “newspapers” range from -20% to -50% for all subsequent cohorts except the over-65s, a stronghold that alone is worth 40% of regular consumers.
Northeast has the highest per capita consumption
Emilia-Romagna is the region with the largest share of consumers based on population (61.3 percent), followed by Valle d’Aosta (60.5 percent), Tuscany (60.4 percent) and Veneto (59.8 percent). The province of Trento is the area with the greatest growth in consumers (+11 percent), Basilicata the greatest contraction (-9 percent). Among macro-regions, the Northeast ranks first at 59.4 percent, followed by the Center (57.4 percent), the Northwest (56.7 percent), the South (51.1 percent), and the Islands (46.8 percent).
