Real and fake Italian products. An analysis on German buying consumer behaviour.

Abstract

This Master thesis has analyzed the perception of German consumer regarding “Made in Italy” products and lifestyle; in particular we wanted to understand how real and fake Italian products are perceived in Germany and what German consumer focuses on. This project origins from a personal six-months experience in Stuttgart, in the south of Germany. Starting from a general analysis of the main theories that have studied the consumer behaviour’s mechanisms: how the consumer is influenced by his/her representations and mental concepts, how things are categorized in his/her mind, what are the main misconceptions that consumers can be vulnerable to. Then we have made a digression concerning the presence of “Made in Italy” in Germany, providing also examples obtained on field during the experience in Stuttgart. We have considered only food products as pasta, oil, jam, cheese and then furniture and household items. We have, also, made an analysis regarding dates, we have obtained from a survey launched during the permanence in Baden-Württemberg: applying the principles of statistics we have studied the answers of a sample of German people between 20 and 50 years old. The aim is having a personal estimation of how the Germans behave themselves towards Italian products: are they able to distinguish real Italian from fake? What does influence their perceptions and consumer behaviour? After this analysis, we comment on the results and provide personal explanations about them.