Italian petfood market worth more than €2 billion

The 13th edition of the Assalco-Zoomark Report produced by the Italian National Association of Pet Food and Pet Care Companies reveals a thriving and steadily growing market.

In 2019 there were 60.27 million pets in Italy (a ratio of 1 to 1 with the human population of 60.32 million according to ISTAT), generating 2.8% year-on-year turnover growth.

The dog and cat food segment registered a turnover of €2,078 million with a total of 556,424 tons sold through the Grocery, Traditional Petshop and Petshop Chains channels.

Online sales of dog and cat food totalled €13.1 million in 2019. Although still very small compared to the total value of sales generated by physical retail stores, the e-commerce growth rate was +57% on 2018 with 55.3% consisting of cat food and 44.7% dog food.

Bags and tins are the forms of packaging that account for the highest cross-channel sales (50.3% the value share for bags and 21.7% for tins), together making up 72% of market revenues and 76% of volumes.

The sachet is the third largest type of packaging sold (16.6% value share of the total market), with higher than market-average growth across all channels analysed (+4.6% in value and volume). The other forms of packaging (tray and box) account for the remaining share of the market.

As for sizes, one aspect that is similar across all channels is the wet cat food segment, where sizes