Consumer insights

Who are the main consumers of stockfish in Italy? Perception and frequency


One thing that is commonly mistaken by Italian consumers, is the difference between baccalà and stockfish. For stockfish, awareness is less than 1 in 3 consumers, with higher awareness in Liguria and Veneto among individuals aged 55-65 years old.

Further focusing on the qualities that consumers find fit most with stockfish, the results are the following: 

Figure 27: Consumers in Italy's perception of stockfish. Source: Stockfish trends and insights | Nielsen IQ 2024

Italians’ main reason to buy stockfish is, that this traditional dish offers health benefits and tastes good, with even more Italians recognizing the traditional part in 2024 compared to 2022. However, in 2024 there were less Italians that found value for money as a driver for consumption. In the same report from Nielsen, substitution of stockfish out of traditional stockfish dishes with other types of seafood were explored. 4 out of 10 consumers have at least once substituted stockfish with fresh cod, salmon or baccalà. The three main reasons for this were that other products were easier to find, because of the price and that it was hard to find high quality stockfish. 

NSC’s consumer tracker monitors stockfish consumption both at home and out-of-home,side and this question pertaining to frequency is split into different types of consumers. To further simplifying this, we have chosen to call divide this into (1) Heavy (2) Medium (3) Light and (4) Occasional/ Non-users: 

  • Once a week or more– Heavy
  • Once a month or more – Medium
  • Every third or second month – Light
  • Less frequently than every third month or never – Occasional/ Non-users  
Figure 28: Overview of how often Italian consumers ate stockfish between 2021 and 2024. Source: NSC Seafood Consumer Insights 2024.

The key point of introducing stockfish to consumers that either eat it less frequently than every third month or never at all, has had an impact in increasing the consumption of stockfish in the medium consumer group. 

The next point is there is a slow increase for medium consumers, which in the market has been shown as more consumption of stockfish during weekends and festive occasions instead of weekday consumption. 

Figure 29: Italian seafood consumers split between at home and out of home consumption of stockfish between 2022 and 2024. Source: NSC Seafood Consumer Insights 2024

In figure 29, the split between stockfish consumption at home, at a restaurant and from takeaway is presented. Italian consumers have switched some of their consumption habits pertaining to stockfish. More and more of the consumption now happens outside of the home. This resonates well with the increasing servings presented in the foodservice sector in the previous chapter.  

The NSC also goes deeper into the mind of the consumer, with questions spanning from what weekdays, at what time of day and how to prepare different types of species. 

Figure 30: Time of the week, occasion and what Italians did while eating stockfish at home. Source: NSC Seafood Consumer Insight 2024.

Salmon consumers – where and how often do they eat?  

Figure 31: Overview of how often Italian consumers ate salmon between 2021 and 2024. Source: NSC Seafood Consumer Insights 2024.

For salmon, the same consumer groups are created and presented in figure 31. Heavy and medium consumers make up around the same number of salmon consumers in Italy throughout the whole period. A slight decline in “Occasional/ Non-users” indicate that introducing salmon to new potential consumers have been made since 2022. 

When it comes to the eating at home, in a restaurant or someplace similar or from takeaway part for salmon, this has not notably changed since 2022. Around 71 % of Italians eat salmon at home, 20 % eat it at a restaurant or someplace similar, while the remaining 9 % eat it from takeaway. 

Figure 32: Split between the different types of salmon Italians choose to eat at home. Source: NSC Seafood Consumer Insight 2024.

Figure 32 presents the split between the different types of salmon Italians eat at home. Not surprisingly, fresh salmon accounts for nearly half of home consumption in Italy. This coincides with the at home consumption figures presented in the chapter “Seafood in retail”, Salmon Natural Fresh volumes make up around half of the total volumes for overall salmon home consumption. 

Italian consumers, like all consumers chose to buy salmon based on different needs. Starting with emotional benefits, this can be described as a feeling gained or a motivation behind eating salmon. While on the other hand functional features are specific product features the consumer is looking for when choosing to eat salmon. 

Figure 33: Reasons to eat salmon at home. Source: NSC Seafood Consumer Insight.

Overall, both the emotional benefits and functional features sought when eating salmon coincides well with each other, as presented in figure 33. “Healthy” and “tasty” goes well with “everybody gets something they enjoy”, “a sense of enjoyment” and “helps me maintain a healthy diet/eating habits”. The other three functional features are in line with global consumer trends/ worries (convenience, inflation and sustainability).