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Rimini, 9th January 2024 . The countdown has begun to the 45th edition of SIGEP - the Dolce World Expo, the international exhibition of artisan gelato, pastry, bakery and coffee organised by Italian Exhibition Group and scheduled to take place at Rimini Expo Centre from 20th 24th January.
It will be the reference event for dolce foodservice world, whose supply chains represent an important economic flywheel for Made in Italy food, as shown by the data collected below.

Gelato: consumption recovers in 2023 and artisan product purchases increase
In Italy, turnover grew by 11% compared to 2022 touching on €3 billion between gelato parlours, pastry shops and bars that sell gelato (€2.7 billion in 2022, €2.3 billion in 2021 and €1.85 billion in 2020).
Despite a sharp increase in raw material costs, higher end prices and unfavourable weather conditions, the quantities sold did not diminish and actually increased slightly (+1%), which bodes well for the future.
Expenditure per capita in 2023 was around €43, up from the previous year, joined by foreign tourism expenditure of €2.5 per person.
Italy boasts over 9,300 purely gelato parlours (+0.3% compared to 2022), 12,000 pastry shops and about 18,000 bars offering artisan gelato for a total of over 39,000 outlets.
At an Italian level, artisan gelato production venues are mainly concentrated in Lombardy (2,120 business locations), Sicily (1,610), Campania (1,564), Lazio (1,453), Veneto (1,305) and Emilia Romagna (1,235).
In addition to Italy, which is still in top position, the consumption of artisan gelato is increasing in Europe and the rest of the world. Here, the highest concentrations of artisan gelato parlours are to be found in Argentina, the United States and Brazil, while good levels of growth are reported in Poland and Spain.

Ingredients, semi-finished products, machinery and furnishings: the Italian supply chain exceeds 4 billion in turnover
Italy´s leadership also concerns the sector of ingredients and semi-finished products with 65 companies involved and a 2023 turnover of 1.1 billion euros, up 9% compared to 2022, and an export share of about 65%. Moreover, the growth of this sector has led to a steady increase in employment over the years and it is estimated that the number of employees, both direct and indirect (sales networks), has now reached 4,000.
The gelato parlour machinery, display cabinet and furnishing sector also sees Italy as a key player. In 2023, turnover amounted to approximately €650 million, of which €350 million related to sales to artisan gelato venues. Companies in the sector exported over 70% of their production and employed around 1,500 people in Italy alone. The last year was substantially stable in terms of markets with Italy holding up well and the German market a little weak, but offset by increases in other markets.


The Italian supply chain as a whole (gelato parlours, ingredients, machinery, equipment, display cabinets) exceeded 4 billion euros in turnover for the first time, providing employment in Italy to over 100,000 people.
Germany is the main destination market for the sector´s Italian exports, followed by France, Canada and the USA. Also emerging are the Arabian markets with Saudi Arabia and the Emirates in the lead.
Source: AIG . Italian Gelato Makers´ Association, UIF on internal data, ACOMAG, Confartigianato, Confesercenti, Demoskopea, ISTAT, TCI

Festive cakes, a cultural phenomenon without crisis
There is no crisis in the festive cake market: despite panettone and pandoro price increases (5% on average for artisan products, 3% for industrial products), sales volumes remain strong.
And in 2023, the artisan product, especially panettone, surpassed the industrial product in value: demand for the artisan product, in a 30-thousand-tonne and 270-million-euro market, represented 58% of the sector´s value, settling at 140 million euros compared to the industrial product, which declined. Of the 9.5 million families that consume panettone, 2.4 million bought an artisan version. And purchasing is increasingly carried out online with e-commerce, preferred by 20% of customers.
Consumer preferences were equally divided between panettone (81%) and pandoro (82.2%), with the industrial product prevailing. Panettone remained the favourite in northern Italy, while pandoro was more popular in southern regions.
In the majority of cases, Italians preferred those made according to the traditional recipe (66% for panettone, 69.3% for pandoro), confirming the fact that these leavened products are a real cultural phenomenon linked to tradition.
All the other traditional local dolce specialities also did well: about 150 products linked to individual territories whose consumption, already on the rise at Easter 2023, was estimated to grow at Christmas as well. In Italy, about 20,000 artisan companies operate in the dolce foodservice sector, employing over 65,000 people and representing one fifth of Italian artisan food products.
Source: Confartigianato - Italian Food Union

Coffee: 95 million cups of coffee are consumed every day in bars, restaurants and at home
The consumption patterns and preferences of Italians are changing in terms of coffee, a beverage that nonetheless maintains its supremacy as the most popular in our country.
Pods and capsules were worth 40% of the entire market (595 million), although moka coffee is still the leader with sales of 640 million.

In Italy, more than 95 million cups of coffee are consumed every day by 97% of Italians, who are regular consumers of the beverage in bars, restaurants and at home.
Italy´s large-scale retail trade channels more than half the volume of roasted coffee sold with a further 20.6% channelled through traditional retail, specialised shops and e-commerce. The remaining 25.2% is, on the other hand, split between hotels, restaurants, cafeterias and catering (15.4%) and vending machines and Office Coffee Service (9.8%).
The Italian coffee industry turnover was € 4.5 billion in 2022.
Source: Circana . Mediobanca

Bread: consumption stable and new products introduced
Fresh bread bought at the bakery is by far the favourite of Italians. In 2022, it was consumed by 84.9% of our fellow citizens, who continued to buy it regularly despite price increases of 27% from 2021 to 2022. The average annual consumption per capita is 41 kg.
More than 20,000 artisan bakeries operate throughout Italy, producing more than 1.5 million tonnes of bread each year.
In bakeries at the moment, 70% of the artisans´ work is related to bread production, while pizza and focaccia, which account for 23.5% of the work, and pastries with 6.2%, are on the rise.

As for preferences, bread made with white flour was in first place with 39%, followed by durum wheat semolina (28%) and multi-grain (24%): consumption of the latter has been growing for several years at the expense of the other two. Moreover, wholemeal or semi-wholemeal bread is increasingly consumed.
Consumption evolution is constantly changing with new types of bread becoming more and more popular despite the fact that their prices are considerably higher than those of ordinary bread.
A recent survey conducted by ITALMOPA (Industrial Association of Italian Millers) showed that 24% of those interviewed intend to increase their consumption of bread made from organic flours, 19% from ancient grain flours and 18% from stone-ground flours. On the other hand, only 14% of consumers intend to increase their consumption of bread made purely from national or regional grain flours.
Source: AIBI - Italian Bakery Ingredients Association / ITALMOPA

´Out-of-home´ in Europe: dolce bakery grew with 11.4 billion products served
According to an analysis by Circana, which monitors out-of-home consumption in the five major European countries, the annual figure, updated to September 2023, saw consumption in Europe growing by +12% in expenditure and 6.7% in visits compared to the same period a year earlier.
Although every country was affected by the price increase, Spain led spending in Europe with +14.9%, followed by France and Germany.

Visits in Europe are driven by France (+8.3%), Italy is in line with the European average in terms of visits but below average, together with Great Britain, in terms of expenditure. As far as the dolce foodservice sector is concerned, and bakery in particular, the number of products (croissants and similar) purchased away from home grew by 6% with France and Great Britain in the lead.
In Europe, the propensity to buy pastry products remains stable with 18.3% of visits: Italy is the most important country with consumers choosing croissants or similar in 1 in 4 visits. Matteo Figura, Executive Director Foodservice for Circana Italia, who will read and interpret these data for Sigep, states that ´with 11.4 billion products served between Italy, Spain, France, England and Germany, baked goods are an essential component of the entire dolce foodservice sector, which has seen a slowdown in growth in recent years due to new out-of-home lifestyle habits. It needs a new boost of innovation like the one we witnessed in the years before the pandemic.´

FOCUS ON SIGEP 2024
Dates: 20-24 January 2024; Organizer: Italian Exhibition Group SpA; In collaboration with: the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation and ITA . Italian Trade Agency; Under the patronage of: the Ministry of Agriculture, Food Sovereignty and Forestry, The Ministry of Enterprise and Made in Italy, Emilia-Romagna Region, Province of Rimini, Romagna Chamber of Commerce, Rimini Council; edition: 45th; frequency: annual; event: international trade show; entry: trade only; Info: www.sigep.it

PRESS CONTACT SIGEP ITALIAN EXHIBITION GROUP
head of media relation & corporate communication: Elisabetta Vitali; press office manager: Marco Forcellini; press office specialist: Mirko Malgieri
international press office coordinator: Silvia Giorgi; media@iegexpo.it

MEDIA AGENCY SIGEP: Mind The Pop
Martina Vacca: martina@mindthepop.it, mob. +39 339 748 4994; Fabrizio Raimondi: fabrizio@mindthepop.it, mob. +39 335 389 848; Benedetto Colli: benedetto@mindthepop.it, mob. 380 371 2272; Stefano Chiossi: stefano@mindthepop.it, mob. + 39 388 739 4358.

This press release contains forecast elements and estimates that reflect the management´s current opinions (´forward-looking statements´), particularly regarding future management performance, realization of investments, cash flow trends and the evolution of the financial structure. For their very nature, forward-looking statements have a component of risk and uncertainty, as they depend on the occurrence of future events. The effective results may differ (even significantly) from those announced, due to numerous factors, including, only by way of example: food service market and tourist flow trends in Italy, gold and jewellery market trends, green economy market trends; the evolution of raw material prices; general macroeconomic conditions; geopolitical factors and evolutions in the legislative framework. Moreover, the information contained in this release does not claim to be complete, and has not been verified by independent third parties. Forecasts, estimates and objectives contained herein are based on the information available to the Company as at the date of this release.