SUMMARY
This thesis aims to analyse the marketing and communication strategies of Alternative Food Supply Chains (AFSCs) through a literature review and a comparative analysis of two Belgian and two Italian initiatives. The first part of the thesis gives an overview of new approaches to production and consumption systems. Through a literature review, we hereby describe the new forms of dynamism that are emerging in the agro-food sector to contrast the more standardised mode of production. At the same time, we investigate the increasing relevance given to the cultural and emotional dimension of food, which leads to a broader involvement of consumers. The second part of this thesis aims to analyse the new marketing and communication strategies that can be deployed to fulfil the new consumer demands. This is done through a comparative analysis of four case studies that took place in the wider context of the European SUS-CHAIN project (“Marketing sustainable agriculture: an analysis of the potential role of new food supply chains in sustainable rural development”). The cases under study are two Belgian examples of direct sales (De Westhoek Hoeveproducten) and organic production (Biomelk Vlaanderen) and two Italian cases concerning a typical product (Raw milk sheep cheese of the Pistoia Mountain) and organic production (Cooperativa Agricola Firenzuola). The comparative analysis aims to identify common and particular characteristics of the initiatives’ marketing strategies and the type of communication applied, especially with respect to the ‘locality’ characteristics of the product. For each core issue, the key factors influencing the performance of the FSCs and their critical points are identified. The results learn that the communication of a clear and coherent message upon the quality of alternative products and the environmental, social and cultural values linked with them, is necessary to create the consumers’ willingness to buy these products. The establishment of a network in which all actors share the same goals and co-operate is furthermore essential for the creation of an effective message. Moreover, the initiatives under study demonstrate that the communication about alternative productions can’t be conducted through a conventional conception of marketing, but new strategies, that aim to involve and link up with consumers, have to be developed. This however requires new skills of producers, who have to be supported by diverse institutions and organisations to develop a strategy that can lead to a positive ‘synergy’ effect for the entire territory.
CHAPTER 1
CHANGING OF RURAL APPROACH
In recent years, we have witnessed an impressive growth of new or “alternative” forms of chains and networks in agricultural production and food consumption. This trend has to be situated in a context of rural transition, characterised by the crisis of the conventional food sector and, consequently, the evolution of new food quality criteria. Some authors defined this changes as a shift from productivist to “postproductivist” food regime (Ilbery and Bowler, 1998; Schucksmith,1993), or, according to others, a new “rural development paradigm” (van der Ploeg et al, 2000).
In this chapter, we will successively discuss the characteristics and the process of rural shift, the role of the consumers hereby and the consequences for the organisation of food supply chains.
Paragraph 1.1 THE RURAL SHIFT
In this section, we will elaborate upon the causes of the crisis of the conventional agro-food sector and the new, consequent consumer’s attitudes towards food. Moreover, this paragraph foresees an analysis of the Alternative Food Supply Chains (AFSCs), since their emergence to the evaluation of their impact within the European rural economy.
1.1.1 Crisis of the productivist food regime
The above mentioned studies demonstrate that the productivist paradigm has reached its intellectual and practical limits in several issues and aspects.
Considering the macro-economic aspect, a constant grow of the agricultural Gross Value of Production (GVP) can be observed from 1950 to the late 1980s, while the following period is characterised by a stabilisation and in recent years, a decline of the economic agricultural situation is noticed. There are several reasons for this:
¾ In the original Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), the main goal was to provide the population with sufficient food at affordable prices, as it was the first emergency in the post-war years. This led to a growing intensification and specialisation in agriculture, which allowed to realize the initial objectives, but in the long term, a series of negative effects, such as the generation of surplus, increasing regional disparities, the deterioration of the landscape and the loss of quality and variety in food production occurred. In particular, the milk quota system, the falling price of wheat, and the limited amount of “environmental space” meant that it was impossible to expand GVP any further. Thus, the economic logic that accounted the increasing of the total production volume as the principal way to improve agricultural economic performance reached its limits in the saturation of markets. Moreover, the continuous need to improve the technical efficiency of production compelled farmers to invest in new technologies and in external inputs, causing a conspicuous increase of production costs. In the 1990s, costs kept growing as a result of an increasing policy and consumers’ attention for the environment, animal welfare and food safety, leading to a “regulatory treadmill” (Ward, 1993) of new obligatory investments;
¾ The crisis of trust within the agro-food sector due to several food scandals since the late 1970s, such as salmonella, Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE), dioxin residues in milk and food-and-mouth disease. These crises have caused a growing alarm and a lack of confidence among European citizens towards food products and a growing demand for safe food;
¾ The delinking of food production, processing and consumption is furthermore perceived both by institutions and by consumers as a danger that urges to develop some food quality guarantees (Council for Rural Areas, 1998). The European Commission, trying to give an answer to this concern and to improve people’s confidence, set up the European Food Authority, which should supervise all issues related to food safety. Besides, in January 2000, a White Paper of Food Safety has been edited to discuss manners that could lead to establish higher hygiene food standards.
The limitations to the potential productivity of the agrofood sector (quota system and environmental regulations) show that conventional solutions to these issues are not always possible and therefore a “postproductivist” approach is required. New strategies as the diversification of the farm activities (e.g. landscape management, agritourisms), the increase of the value added of the farm products (such as on-farm processing, direct selling), and cost reduction, appear to be viable answers to the crisis of the agrofood sector (Renting et al, 2003).
1.1.2 Emerging approach, the rural development paradigm
As a response to the crisis of the modern agro-food system, new relevance is given to the cultural and emotional dimension of food, which leads to a broader involvement of consumers. These consumers are on the one hand, more exigent in terms of information about food characteristics and production processes, but are on the other hand also more and more fascinated and curious about the non-physical and symbolic features of food, the historical meaning and finally, the social and cultural values. As a consequence, producers have now the necessity of gaining new skills and knowledge to transmit trustworthy information about their production processes, product’s quality, as well as to emphasise the psychological attributes of their food.
Without doubt, we can consider the emergence of the rural development paradigm as the search for a new agricultural development model, in response to the crisis of the food sector caused by the modernisation of European agriculture. This process implies the creation of alternative productions and services and the reconstruction of the agricultural sector within a strategy of realignment with European society. The new paradigm is fundamentally built around the reconfiguration of rural resources, such as land, labour, nature, animals, plants, networks, market partners, and town-countryside relations, that have to be adapted to the new rural approach (van der Ploeg and Frouws, 1999) that involves new linkages between rural areas and society at large (Knickel and Renting, 2000). This cannot be done just with the creation of “new initiatives”, but through the reconsideration of the heterogeneous realities of the European countryside, often perceived as insignificant by the modern paradigm. Thus, as many authors
affirm (van der Ploeg et al, 2000), it will be fundamental to “combine the ‘old’ with the ‘new’”.
Paragraph 1.2 THE NEW ROLE OF CONSUMERS
Rural development however also contrasts with another politico-economic project: the alignment of European agriculture with agro-industrial groups and the dominant policy of the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Nevertheless, the globalisation and industrialisation of the agro-food sector is an increasingly complex and socially contested process (e.g. Arce and Marsden 1993; Watts and Goodman 1997), “in which [there are] many spaces of resistance, alterity1 and
possibility” (Whatmore and Thorne, 1997).
Movements and organisations or simple groups of consumers that are centred on reflexive, ethical considerations of food consumption are growing all around Europe. Consequently, new approaches to the analysis of the evolution of the relationship between food and society, and of the role of consumers, are emerging in the recent literature.
The Marxian perspective about the roles of production and consumption in society considered consumers as completely passive, obscured by the “veil” of commodity fetishism. In this approach to the sociology of agriculture, production is the locus of power and consumer politics are confined to the world of production. Opposite to the Marxian production-centred perspective, a cultural and consumption-oriented view of society is now emerging in the social sciences (Goodman and DuPuis, 2002).
The first agro-food analysis led with a new consideration of the role of consumers is the Marsden and Wringley’s (1995) study on the British food market. In their article the authors conclude that consumers have an “undeveloped” consciousness and they have to acquire a collective awareness necessary to exert their influence on the production system. In a more recent study, Murdoch and Miele (1999) continue in this direction, but with a more complex view of the
1 alterity is the term used by Kirwan to express what is distinctive about a particular alternative
consumers. Considering the “double structure” of the nature in the contemporary society, as moral authority and “utilitarian object”, Murdoch and Miele distinguish between “non standard food production/consumption practices” (such as alternative, localised and differentiated forms of production), and “a set of increasingly globalized mass consumption food patterns”. They explain the expansion of alternative food production networks as a response to the external societal shift and to “the rise of a new culture of consumption, centered upon the search for a healthier diet and the rediscovery of traditional cuisines”. The wider considerations made by Lockie and Kitto (2000) in their study on production-consumption networks, allow to find a conjuncture between the rural “production” sociology and the sociology of food. The authors underline the mutuality in producer and consumer cultures that cannot be considered as separate categories of social life. This discussion brings them to the actor network theory (ANT)2, which
is considered as a tool to reach a fuller understanding of food production-consumption networks, but should focus more on the mutually, material and symbolic interactions, existing within these networks.
The arguments described above move the discussion towards the new role of consumers within the food system. It is now possible to affirm that consumers are carrying out a political action, as direct public contestation and organised social movements clearly prove. The new consumers’ intentions are not only about transparency, but concern more ethical issues, such as social conditions of farmers, animal welfare and environmental-friendly practices. As Goodman and DuPuis (2002) stated, in this context new alliances are growing, which include “consumers as both actual and potential actors, and the social relations formed in consumption –both with producers and with other consumers- are regarded as _____________________________________________________________________
2 Actor network theory (ANT) evolved from the work of Michel Callon (1991) and Bruno Latour
(1992) at the Ecole des Mines in Paris. Their analysis of a set of negotiations describes the progressive constitution of a network in which both human and non-human actors assume identities according to prevailing strategies of interaction. Actors' identities and qualities are defined during negotiations between representatives of human and non-human actants. In this perspective, "representation" is understood in its political dimension, as a process of delegation. The most important of these negotiations is "translation," a multifaceted interaction in which actors (1) construct common definitions and meanings, (2) define representativities, and (3) co-opt each other in the pursuit of individual and collective objectives. In the actor-network theory , both actors and actants share the scene in the reconstruction of the network of interactions leading to the stabilization of the system. But the crucial difference between them is that only actors are able to put actants in circulation in the system.
more than just ‘private’, that is, a-political, action”. Consumers’ actions have a political identity when they exercise “the capacity of act”, affecting the future form of society. Within this debate, the political possibilities of consumption appear more than merely a niche marketing opportunity.
Paragraph 1.3 ALTERNATIVE FOOD SUPPLY CHAINS
In the past two decades, new forms of dynamism have emerged in the agro-food sector. These new forms are well represented by the expression “quality-food markets”, contrasting the existing, anonymous, mass food markets. As we have seen, this phenomenon can be collocated in a wider situation of transition, both in rural economies and in society. As Marsden (1998) observes, “food markets are becoming more differentiated on the basis of a range of socially constructed food quality criteria”.
To clarify this new agricultural dynamics, it’s important to introduce some definitions. The expression “Alternative Food Supply Chains” (AFSCs) is used to represent the new, differentiated, emerging networks of producers, consumers, and other actors that set up Alternative Strategies (AS), to contrast the more standardised industrial mode of food productions (Murdoch et al, 2000).
On the other hand, the concept of “Short Food Supply Chains” (SFSCs) applies to the interrelations between actors who are directly involved in the production, processing, distribution and consumption of new food products. Different meanings can be given to the term “short”. Firstly, it is used as the new food supply chains shorten the long and anonymous industrial mode of production of food, secondly they shorten the relation between producers and consumers, bringing the latter closer to the origin of their food, and lastly they shorten the relation between locality and food products. The SFSC concept is more specific than AFSCs, because it expresses the interrelations between the actors involved in the new food networks.
Going beyond the definitions, a great diversity emerges, when exploring AFSCs. The differences are the result of the peculiarities of different agricultural realities, such as, cultural and gastronomic traditions, consumers’ perception of food commodity, organisational structures of the food supply chains, and also, institutional and policy support. As Renting et al (2003) state “AFSCs, by their nature, employ
different social constructions and equations with ecology, locality, region, quality convention, and consumer cultures”, thus we should say rural “developments”. Nevertheless, as Marsden et al (2000b) highlight, a common characteristic exists, “the emphasis upon the type of relationship between the producer and the consumer in these supply chains, and the role of this relationship in constructing value and meaning, rather than solely the type of product itself”.
1.3.1 Emergence of AFSCs
The literature on AFSCs is still highly fragmented, but it describes a wide variety of initiatives and an impressive growth of new food production systems. At the light of this richness of documentation, an important consideration is necessary. AFSCs have been considered for a long time as a potential solution for less-favoured rural areas, to the critical situation caused by the market liberalisation and the continue request for technological modernisation of the food production system. Actually, data suggest that these new rural activities not only involve peripheral areas, but even more productive parts of the European countryside.
The emergence of new food circuits in globalised agricultural economies should be assessed considering the changes that they have induced at both the consumers and the producer sides. From the consumers’ side, the growing distrust in the quality of food, due to the several scandals of the sector, has increased the attention for environmental, animal welfare and healthy issues. In addition, the increasing distance between the phases of production, processing and consumption, related to the industrial mode of production, have resulted in the necessity of establishing some kind of institutionalised food quality guarantee. Another key element is the new culture of consumption, in which food commodities are linked with different expectations and lifestyles.
From the production perspective, the emergence of new food supply chains should be seen in the light of the limits demonstrated by the productivist model: the saturation of markets and the increased possibilities for sourcing food industries with non-agricultural primary materials. Moreover, the constant request of modernisation and efficiency caused the continuous increasing of the production costs.
In “Food supply chains approaches: exploring their role in rural development” Marsden et al (2000a) examine the food supply chains’ evolution to understand “how, why and under what conditions specific food supply chains develop”. In doing so, the authors classify four key parameters of supply chain evolution:
¾ Temporal evolution: when analysing the background to supply chains case studies in Europe, two distinct periods of development are identified. In the first phase, from the ‘50s and ‘60s initiatives that are mainly characterised by regional identity emerged, while the second period began in the early 1990s, as we have seen above, in response to the crisis of the conventional agricultural sector;
¾ Spatial evolution: the high demand for specific products can create conditions for the expansion of particular forms of production within regions. The growth in demand of typical products (Product of Designated Origin, for example) may improve the performance of the rural economy in the area of production, especially if the production involves a high proportion of local resources. Some AFSCs have the potential capacity to become central to a region’s agriculture (e.g. Parmigiano Reggiano in Emilia Romagna, or champagne grape wines in Champagne);
¾ Demand evolution: often linked to spatial evolution, it expresses the capacity of markets and distribution channels of specific products to expand from one scale of operation to another (for example from local to regional or national) This expansion can involve both generic and dedicated food markets, and thus, in order to maximize the potential of supply chains development, a flexible and dynamic approach to product development and marketing is desirable;
¾ Associational and institutional evolution: associational networks are usually informal, but they are often fundamental in establishing trust and co-operation between different supply chain actors. Institutional interfaces are, on the contrary, characterised by a high degree of formalisation and they can offer support and services to farmers. Interestingly, some recent
developments have occurred without an institutional support. Anyway, the evidence suggests that in most of the cases both associational and institutional interfaces should be at the base of the sustaining rural development.
To sum up, we could state that the future development of food markets depends on the capacity of food circuits to regain consumers’ trust through guaranteeing food quality in a credible way, and meeting specific criteria. As Renting et al (2003) have underlined, “conventional answers are often no longer possible”, and new alternative strategies, such as nature and landscape management, agritourisms, quality production, on farm-processing and direct selling, have to be set up to improve farms’ economic performance. Even if the emerging of AFSCs implies a shift in power relations, diminishing the dependency on financial capital, the agro-industry, the global commodity markets and the big retailers, it would be restrictive to see AFSCs just a tool to reach a higher share of added value. We have to consider AFSCs as response, as Kirwan (2004) states, a way to “change the mode of connectivity” between the production and consumption of food, generally through reconnecting food to the social, cultural and environmental context of its production. As a matter of fact, they reground the agricultural production again on ecological, social and cultural capital, by approaching the food system to the new needs of the society and so, they can constitute a potential strategy to construct transparent chains and to redefine the consumers-producers relation.
1.3.2 Classification of AFSCs
The emergence of alternative food supply chains has been an unexpected phenomenon (Renting et al, 2003). The neoclassical notion of the market, so far from the social relationships intrinsic to AFSCs, is not useful to understand the recent development of the food sector where these new food networks result from the cooperation of various actors in the agro-food sector, such as farmers, processors, wholesalers, retailers, and consumers. Thus, new approaches, in which markets are socially constructed are necessary, or as Marsden and Arce (1995) affirm, we need a “sociology of the market”, which analyses the social interactions between the different actors of the agro-food chains.
One of the first steps that needs to be taken when identifying the dynamics of AFSCs is to understand the mechanisms through which specific consumers’ demands and producers’ supplies align and result in specific and corresponding “production codes”. To this aim, Renting et al (2003) elaborated in their “Understanding alternative food networks: exploring the role of short food supply chains in rural development” an analysis based upon the different types of relationships, that consumers can have with producers in the chain and how these relationships can construct values.
With regard to the dimensions of food supply chains the authors identify two interrelated dimensions, describing the producer-consumer relation: the organisational structure and the specific “mechanisms entailed in these to extend relations in time and space” on the one hand, and the different quality definitions and conventions involved in AFSCs on the other.
Considering the first parameter, three categories of alternative food supply chains have been identified by Marsden et al (2000a):
¾ Face-to-face food supply chains: e.g. farmers’ markets, farm shops, roadside sales. Consumers buy directly from producers or processors. The direct contact between producer and consumer is the main characteristic of this type of initiative and permits to create commercial and personal interaction based upon trust;
¾ Proximate food supply chains: this category of AFSCs is extended over long distances in time and space, needing a more complex institutional organisation. Initiatives of this category are characterised by collaboration amongst actors of the agrofood chains, such as the creation of regional quality hallmarks (Banks, 2001; Roep, 2002), farm shop groups, consumer cooperatives, thematic routes, special events such as fairs, local shops or restaurants. Generally, the products are sold in the region of production, thus consumers become aware of the local nature of the product at the point of retail;
¾ Extended food supply chains: are for example certification labels and production codes. In this case, products are sold out of the region of production, and even in national and international markets. Despite the geographical distance between the places of production and consumption, we can define these chains to be “short” because the information, which is attached to the product (for example, printed on packaging or communicated at the point of retail) reaches that consumers enabling to connect with the place of production and the linked values. Thus, the achievement of a premium price for this type of products is strongly linked with the credibility of the message that arrives to consumers. Extended chains have very articulated and formalised structures and foresee the creation of brands and labels. The involvement of external bodies of control and certification is at the base of the trust that consumers have in these productions.
Regarding the specific quality definitions and conventions involved in the new food networks, we know that they have to be shared by all the actors of the chain to construct transparent market relations.
Within AFSCs two main categories of quality definitions can be identified, based on:
¾ Regional or artisan characteristics: the quality attributes of these products are strongly linked with the depend on the particular production process (artisanal, traditional, farm based, etc) or on the natural conditions and the gastronomic traditions of the place of production. In this category, we can find even “fair trade” products, which base their quality definition on links with producers and on ethical parameters;
¾ Ecological or natural characteristics: in this case, quality is defined in terms of the links of food production and consumption with bioprocesses and sustainable and environmental-friendly methods such as organic and integrated productions. This category also includes products that are considered by consumers as healthy and safe or the ones distinguished by respect for natural behaviour, conservation of the landscape, and animal welfare.
It is evident that some “hybrids” of quality attributes exist, such as regional products which link their image with the regional dimension, but even with the safeguarding of the rural landscape, and the environment.
1.3.3 Impact of AFSCs in Europe
The assessment of the impact of AFSCs in Europe is rather problematic because of the lack of official data of sufficient reach and quality. Some data at European level are emerging concerning organic farming, but for all other fields, the problem is still present. Despite this limitation, the EU funded a research programme called “The Socio-Economic Impact of Rural Development Policies” or IMPACT, succeeded to make an overview of the impact of AFSCs in several European countries. Within this study, data have been collected according to three different types of initiatives: organic farming, quality production (including on-farm processing) and direct selling. Between the countries, large differences occur concerning the incidence of AFSCs. One of the indicators chosen for the analysis regards the number and the type of farms involved in AFSCs. With respect to this parameter, some general considerations can be done: AFSCs appear to be mainly taken up by medium-size farms as a strategy to survive, trying to generate a sufficient income and to make the activity more viable. The project also found that AFSCs have developed substantially in all countries, but large differences occur within the various countries. In terms of the number of farms involved, the largest development of AFSCs can be found in the Mediterranean countries like Italy, France and Spain, but also in Germany whereas they are much less developed in UK and the Netherlands.
Another important difference can be detected in the specific types of AFSCs that are most developed within the various countries. In countries like Italy, France and Spain the development of AFSCs is basically focused on regional quality productions and direct selling, which are built on long-lasting and strongly rooted cultural and gastronomic traditions. On the contrary, in the Northern European countries (Germany, the Netherlands and UK), the development of AFSCs is more centred on modern quality definitions (e.g. environmental sustainability or animal welfare), and linked to new and innovative forms of marketing, such as farm-groups, box-schemes or farmer markets.
For organic farming, less differences occur. In several countries like the Netherlands, UK, Ireland and Spain, the organic sector is quite weakly developed, because of the lack of sufficient domestic demand, due to the high price of the products and to the shortcomings in institutional support. Even in this case, a difference needs to be highlighted with respect to consumers’ purchase behaviour. As a matter of fact, in the Northern European countries consumers appear more concerned about the environment and are more conscious of the relations between organic food purchase and environmental sustainability, whereas Mediterranean consumers are more concerned about the local origin.
The field of direct sales at the farm represents the activity with the largest number of farms involved and the highest impact level, although different degrees of penetration can be found in the different countries.
With respect to the socio-economic impact, Germany, Italy and France are the countries where AFSCs have reached the highest performance.
Concluding, the study demonstrates that “AFSCs should not be seen in isolation from overall rural development patterns and that each country is characterised by a specific composition of rural development practices in response to national contextual factors” (Renting et al, 2003). The most important conclusion of this analysis is the identification of the interrelations of AFSCs with other rural development practices. Moreover, empirical evidence suggests that rural development practices have not only a positive impact on income level in farms but a synergy effect on rural economy is also created because it increases the capacity to create new wealth through a better valorisation of local, endogenous resources in rural areas (van der Ploeg and Long, 1994; Ray, 1998).
In a nutshell, new equations between space, nature, quality value and product can come together in AFSCs, but they need organised actions and associations, which create and then maintain the new synergy. Some of the cases demonstrate that new supply chains can be successfully created, even by groups of formerly “powerless” producers operating in the mass industrial food system, but the positive outcome of this new type of supply chains depends on the involvement of other stakeholders.
CHAPTER 2
MARKETING EVOLUTION AND CHANGING
OF QUALITY CRITERIA
The first chapter of this thesis has described the complex situation of the European agricultural sector and the emergence of alternative food supply chains. A better comprehension of some issues within this complex scenario is however necessary to introduce the core part of this thesis, the comparative analysis of four Belgian and Italian AFSCs. Therefore, this chapter introduces some notions and tools in the field of marketing and quality issues that will be used in the further analysis.
Paragraph 2.1 EVOLUTION OF MARKETING STRATEGIES
One of the most remarkable outcomes of the setting up of alternative food supply chains is the achievement of a new relationship between consumers, farmers and producers based on reciprocity, trust and shared values. As a matter of fact, the evolution towards the “post-productivist” agricultural model gives origin to new styles of connecting to the market, which legitimise consumers in acquiring an active role in this change. In developed countries an increasing number of consumers show awareness and concern about conventional and industrialised farming, especially with respect to the production of negative externalities (pollution, loss of biodiversity, economic and social erosion of rural areas, taste homogenisation, etc.), which leads them to look for local foods, environmental-friendly products, regional specialities, etc. (Callon, 2004; Wheaterell et al, 2003). The acknowledgement of these phenomena together with the growing interest for AFSCs has raised the need for a theoretical research aiming at giving a more recognised basis to their action to the “alternative” producers. In this respect, Goodman (1999) suggests that it should be recognised that AFSCs reconfigure the relationship production-consumption in the process of extending their spatial and temporal reach. As a consequence, the active role of consumers in the genesis and reproduction of these new economic forms must be recognised on the one side (Goodman and DuPuis, 2002), as well as the role of the new farmers and their changing communicative patterns in the food system arena. The most remarkable
implication is that the conventional marketing approach where consumers are addressed as a market segment needs to be abandoned in favour of a new approach, more able to meet the new trends in consumption-production. In this respect, Brunori and Marescotti (2004) examine a range of marketing approaches from conventional to the new “radical marketing”, passing through post-modern and cognitive marketing.
2.1.1 Conventional marketing
The conventional marketing approach is based on the assumption that producers can obtain better performances by understanding consumers’ attitudes and mobilising their resources to satisfy consumers’ needs. As a consequence consumers’ consciousness, aspirations and needs are continuously monitored by an “army” of researchers in order to achieve a more and more complete product classification, which implies positioning. This is the definition of a set of characteristics that qualifies the product for a specific target of consumers, and communication of the product identity to a certain group of consumers (Callon et al, 2002). Besides, the conventional marketing approach focuses on narrow definitions of consumers and subscribes to the view that consumer demand can be satisfied by short-term and simplistic answers. However, there are different ways in which consumers are taken into consideration and they can vary between the two extremes of manipulation and understanding. Basically, “manipulation” is based on the idea that marketing has the necessary resources to construct consumers’ needs through research techniques, symbolic production and persuasion and control at distance (Lockie and Kitto, 2000; Cova, 1997). In this case, we are not that far from a proper “creation of wants”, through strategic actions based on advertising. The other extreme, “understanding”, is based on the principle that the task of marketing is to satisfy consumers’ needs after carefully studying them. Such a dichotomy results in a range of different interpretations of consumers’ satisfaction. Marketing aims, on the one hand, at creating commodities as surrogates for “real” needs and, as in the case of food companies, at getting consumers to form an “emotional bond” with products, but on the other hand, marketing tries to meet consumers’ demands on the basis of a wider interpretation of their expectations, after having acknowledged the high degree of
complexity of food systems and the constantly changing food patterns, trends and beliefs about food.
2.1.2 Post-modern marketing
The so-called post-modern approach (Brown, 1995; Cova, 1997) represents a first step in the direction of a non-manipulative approach to marketing, as it is based on the acknowledgement that the shift to a post-productivist era implies a strong revision of the conventional marketing approaches. As a matter of fact, two phenomena need hereby to be acknowledged, on the one hand new tendencies to individualisation are emerging, but on the other hand consumers increasingly define their own identity by belonging to a certain network. As a consequence, firms cannot rely anymore upon steady market segments, based on the assumption that consumers are concerned with “macro-issues” such as price, convenience and time, but they rather have to recognise that food patterns and consumer demand are multidimensional and in a permanent state of transition. To this respect, Cova states that the results of what we could define as the “acknowledgement process” are different strategic options, distributed somehow along the manipulation-understanding scheme. Indeed on one extreme firms assume individualisation as fully performed, so that marketing becomes a substitute for lost communal links. This is the case of direct marketing based on huge databases, personalised services, customisation, emotional communication, which are conceived as instruments through which creating links between producers and consumers. On the contrary, the point of departure of the opposite extreme, as stated by Cova, is the hypothesis that individualisation leads to new forms of communities that are less steady than in the past and not necessary exclusive, meaning that each person can belong to a plurality of communities. To this respect, Cova looks at marketing from the perspective of “tribal marketing”, according to which producers should shift their attention from the “functional value” of products to their “link value”, that is the ability to strengthen social links between consumers. The “link value” of food is not something new, but, as Goodman and Dupuis highlight, food has in general a strong link value, which can be related to a concept of food culture where food is a kind of “social cement”, binding groups together with shared assumptions. However, in modern society,
there has been a shift from the link value of food to the growing individualisation of consumption, based on the huge choice of different types of food, which results in a new conceptualisation of food as a commodity, allowing whims and fashion to determine its consumption (Lang and Heasman, 2004).
2.1.3 Cognitive marketing
The most remarkable step towards radical marketing starts from the recognition that the relationship production-consumption is characterised by a bi-directional information flow. The aim of marketing therefore shifts from conceiving and adapting products to consumers’ needs to changing consumers’ preferences, enrolling them into the project of producers, especially regarding values upon which the production process is based. In other words, the production sphere expresses its values through the product and it is linked to the consumption sphere through communication practices, aiming at building alliances between producers and consumers in order to protect the product’s meanings. As a result, the action of producers is no longer based on creating wants but rather on learning, conceived both as a strategy and integral part of the product. In other words, we have to look at producers involved in cognitive marketing strategies as at producers having a strong-rooted “vision”, which they want to communicate and share with consumers, enrolling them into their project. According to this point of view, the emphasis is upon the exchange that may occur beyond the market exchange and which involve the inside meanings of food. With respect to the application of this approach, the cognitive aspect is taken into consideration as learning, based on clear signals of the provenance and quality attributes of the product, is considered a component of the product itself.
In conclusion with cognitive marketing an attempt is made in linking producers and consumers by considering them as members of the so-called “communities of value”, which can interact directly through a kind of communication based on learning practices, allowing a continuous process of qualification and re-qualification of the product.
2.1.4 Radical marketing
The basic ideas of the approaches examined so far can be summed up as the following:
¾ conventional and post-modern marketing refer to actions and strategies set up by producers in order to catch consumers’ needs, but there is no aim or interest in opposing to the mainstream production and consumption model; ¾ cognitive marketing, being based on learning, aims at communicating values
to unaware consumers, without necessarily aiming at changing the dominant knowledge and value system.
Looking at the development of these new marketing strategies it is evident that a wider consideration of the notion of “food culture” is emerging as the one expressing how food beliefs and behaviours are socially framed. Indeed, it is more and more acknowledged that food culture involves an entire constellation of socially produced values, attitudes, relationships, tastes, cuisines and practices, which are exhibited through food and comprise shared values and opportunities for differences and distinctions. In this way, people have the possibility to express their identity through food and to derive cultural meanings from it. In such a context, the most remarkable and innovative trait of radical marketing is that producers, moving from the acknowledgement that they can change the environment and take advantage from it, start trying to oppose to the conventional model of production and consumption and to enrol other actors than just producers into their transformational project. According to this approach, what differentiates most radical marketing from post-modern marketing is that producers have something to say, meaning a wide range of motivations different from the mainstream values, so that they consider business as a part of a more general strategy aiming at changing society and introducing new social, ethic and environmental values, into business (Brunori, 2000). As a result, when they interact with consumers, they are not neutral on the object of interaction, but the characteristics of both the production process and the product and the meanings attached to it are not negotiable. As stated by Lockie and Kitto (2000), the idea
beyond radical marketing is that consumption activities, as well as production ones, are inherently political activities as they go beyond individual utility goals. Consequently alliances between producers and consumers within AFSCs and intervention in the public sphere are strictly intertwined so that AFSCs can be conceived as new way of doing politics started by producers through creating alliances with a large number of actors, other than producers, and links between local and global networks.
Recognising the active capacity of other actors than producers to induce a change by activating the network and enrolling other actors (Evans and Yarwood, 2000) and by shifting from production to include other sides of the network represent a step towards a new concept of marketing, which Brunori and Marescotti define “network induced radical marketing”, which is based on the following features:
¾ In the first place, other principles than profits are at stake, as more account is given to incorporating alternative values, such as ecological, ethical or social, into the marketing strategy. As a result, AFSCs should be able to guarantee to all the actors involved a fair distribution of costs and benefits and also non-monetary costs should be considered, such as social and environmental costs. Unfortunately, in spite of all the efforts to consider these economic aspects, they are a source of contradiction within AFSCs, since they are in contrast with the dominant economic logic.
¾ Secondly, within AFSCs, other actors than producers can take the initiative of changing, so that producers may activate an “induced” radical marketing, based on the negotiation with all the actors involved in the network. As a matter of fact, the limit of conventional food networks is a different degree of involvement going from the primary actors that is producers, to the secondary actors, who basically have an indirect role. The direct consequence is an asymmetry in knowledge about the production process and above all a different role of the actors involved in shaping the construction of the chain. ¾ Finally, Brunori and Marescotti suggest that a radical marketing approach
should base the value creation activity on the following formula, which considers four types of value that are the outcomes of the interaction
process within socio-technical networks (Callon et al, 2002), where producers, consumers and all the other actors are actively involved, defined through qualification-requalification processes and consolidated into a broad range of criteria or standards:
PRODUCT VALUE = FUNTIONAL VALUE + LINK VALUE + FAIR MARKET VALUE +
TRANSFORMATIONAL VALUE
Paragraph 2.2 CHANGING OF QUALITY CRITERIA
The problems associated with the industrialisation of the food production, especially the ones regarding food safety and nutrition, are leading the contemporary food system, as Murdoch et al (2000) state, through a ‘qualitative shift’. There is hereby an increased emphasis on quality food and the food regulatory system is concerned rather with the issue of ‘quality’ than ‘quantitative supply’ (Marsden et al, 2000a). This focus on quality by corporate retailers and governments has to be considered as a response to the consumer interest. Actually, consumers in advanced capitalist countries are beginning to be more cautious about food purchase and many of them demand “quality products” (Tognon et al, 1999). The increasing consumer attention for the qualification of food has prompted the European Union to implement regulations to ‘protect’ food which has special character regarding materials, mode of production or a particular geographic origin (e.g. Protected Designation Origin and Protected Geographical Indication).
At the same time, the food quality issue has been used to integrate production and consumption approaches; by rural analysts, who need to bring consumption into their studies of food production, as well as by analysts of consumption, who cannot consider consumption just in terms of the cultural and identity concerns of consumers (Tovey, 2003). This process is not exempt from problems. The interaction between “growing food” and “knowing food”, as Goodman and DuPuis (2002) suggest, is a confrontation between two “arenas of struggle over
knowledges”. Moreover, the notion of “quality” is contested, constructed, and represented differently by diverse actors operating within a variety of regulatory and market fields. This quality concept is socially constructed through the interplay of different actors, and thus, variable according to different socio-cultural contexts. As we already stated above, the production and the maintenance of quality involves the interaction of all the actors of the chain, from initial producer to final consumer, and each of them holds different perspectives of what quality is. While consumers show interest in what is traditionally described as ‘subjective indicators’, that are influenced by experiential phenomena, producers on the other hand base their quality perception upon raw materials and methods of production, and regulatory institutions, finally, are concerning with ‘objective indicators’ of quality (Ilbery and Kneafsey, 2000a).
Considering the traditional marketing perspective, the indicators of quality are traditionally classified in four inter-linked categories (Ilbery and Kneafsey, 2000a):
QUALITY
achieving CERTIFICATION generating ATTRACTION ensuring SPECIFICATION establishing ASSOCIATION¾ Achieving certification: such as PDO and PGI, organic symbol, quality mark, or self regulation;
¾ Establishing association: geographically (with a region or locality) or historically (with a tradition or culture);
¾ Ensuring specification: of production method, raw materials and ownership; ¾ Generating attraction: by the fulfilment of the subliminal wants of consumers
in terms of designs, organoleptic characteristics, appearance and premium price.
All these indicators are socially constructed and because of this, quality is subjected to be manipulated by the different actors of the food system, who want to interpret, represent and regulate it in different ways. The concept of quality is however associated to different meanings for the different actors of the food supply chains, as several authors have observed in their studies on rural activities. Nygard and Storstad (1998), studying the Norwegian food market, observe that in this country consumers conceptions of quality are associated with the notion of trust in the home country food that is considered safe and of high quality.
The importance of the social interaction emerges in the study of the meat industry in Umbria (Italy) led by Ventura and van der Meulen in 1994. The authors found that the beef market in this area is based on a small-scale system, with a high degree of auto-consumption on family farms and direct selling to friend and neighbours. Therefore, consumers perceive the local production as a guarantee of genuineness.
Ilbery and Kneafsey (2000a) in their “Producer constructions of quality in regional speciality food production: a case study from south west England”, make an analysis of the way in which notions of ‘quality’ are constructed, regulated and marketed by producers of Speciality Food Products (SFPs). In this study, it is clear that quality is constructed in terms of the producer’s personal standards, and that the quality perception of their products is deriving from their own involvement in the production process. The producers emphasise the importance of the hand-made nature, the ‘natural’ character of the ingredients, the small-scale system and the special packaging and presentation of their products. An interesting conclusion aspect is that very few producers mentioned the appreciation of the product by the consumers as quality indicator. Moreover, for the producers of this area, the region of origin is not considered as a primary indicator of quality.
In the analysis of Murdoch et al (2000), the authors interpret the demand of quality products as a request for more local and more natural foods. Local nature, local social relations and cultural practices are re-emerging as important features.
In their article, Murdoch et al modify the classification of ‘quality conventions’ made by Boltanski and Thevenot (1991) and identify six different ‘quality conventions’ that are relevant to the judgement of food quality:
¾ The commercial convention is based on an evaluation of the price and saleability of the product;
¾ The domestic convention involves trust; the goods are assessed in terms of locality and linkage with tradition;
¾ The industrial convention is based upon efficiency standards;
¾ The public convention is defined as the recognition by consumers of trademarks, brands and labels;
¾ The civic convention in which food is assessed in terms of social benefits; ¾ The ecological convention that considers how food production involves
nature.
Analysing some Welsh small cheesemakers, Murdoch et al. (2000) observe that the construction of quality is based upon domestic qualifications (trust relationships are central), public qualifications (e.g. in marketing schemes), ecological and civic qualifications (because of the environmental-friendly method of production). As Tovey (2003) assesses in her “Contested regimes of value: exploring ‘alternativity’ in small food producers through their judgements of good food”, that the arguments exposed by Murdoch et al led the authors up to the concept of ‘embeddedness’. However, the same authors state that if alternative production networks define quality exclusively in terms of domestic, ecological and civic conventions, they are likely to remain marginal to the globalised food marketing. Therefore the producers should set up some kind of alignment with the industrial and commercial criteria that ensure economic survival. The main issue that emerges from this discussion regards the importance and the role of alternative food productions in the wider context of the agro-food system. In the Murdoch et al point of view, the importance of AFSCs is strongly linked to their ability to gain a better market position by permeating the industrial system. Nevertheless, several studies suggest that there is an important aspect of the AFSCs role that is underestimated in their arguments. The AFSCs experiences, even if limited and in a marginal position of the market, are often permeating the
“conventional” realities that, because of several reasons, draw inspiration on them.
In her interviews about food quality with alternative food producers in South-West Ireland, Tovey (2003) perceives the ‘aesthetics of craftsmanship’ emerging and these are focalised upon sensory characteristics, such as taste, smell, freshness and appearance. This craft regime of value integrates practices in sourcing, transforming, marketing and selling of alternative food productions. The craft way of production is in opposition to the industrial and commercial regimes. The craft food workers are consequently able to distinguish food safety from food quality because they have developed an “aesthetic of food” whereby it is the variability of the product rather than its standardisation that has value. This variability is derived from the ecological features of the raw materials and the specific local food cultures “which they are reproducing and producing”.
In general, however, quality implies the satisfaction of consumers needs (Vastoia, 1997), and thus a greater effort should be made by researchers and by all the stakeholders of food supply chains to perceive and fulfil the dynamics of the consumers’ request in terms of food quality.
2.2.1 Quality certification
Opposite to the producers perception of quality, the debate within the commercial retailing system and the food policy side is mainly focalised upon the ‘ethics of food’, which places emphasis on the correct development of safety control system and the guarantee of a safe and reasonably priced experience of ‘choice’ to consumers. This approach is clearly a consequence of the consumers’ mistrust due to the several food scares.
The evolution towards an increased level of food safety on the European ambit started in 1985, with the European Product Liability Directive. Certainly, the attention of consumers about food had a great rise after the ‘food scares’ of the ‘90s, but in recent years, the consumers’ interest has gone beyond the mere request of safe food, as demonstrated by the increasing demand for typical products that are often produced under particular, and less restrictive hygienic standards (in comparison with standards used in conventional supply chains (e.g. HACCP and EurepGap)) such as PDO and PGI productions. As a response to the
increased demand for products with an identifiable geographical origin, the Council of the European Communities has set up new regulations (Reg. 2081/92) that incorporate the concept of traceability into the construction of quality, not only because it is a guarantee in terms of health and safety, but it also gives an assurance about the region or the method of production. As Ilbery and Kneafsey (2000a) observe, the consumer’s attention is increasingly focused upon the origin of products and the way they are produced, not only for ‘health’ and ‘safety’ reasons, but also in terms of satisfying a current ‘nostalgia’.
At the same time, private standards regarding not only the food safety, but also and mainly quality features, such as traceability, and production/processing methods, have been development within the agro-food sector. These types of certifications are called “voluntary” because they are not enforced by law, nevertheless, this definition is considered by Vuylsteke et al (2005) as rather relative because they are often imposed to farmers. These standards tend to be formulated and imposed by processors and retailers that increasingly require their supplier to demonstrate that the food meets specific compositional standards and that specific food hygiene and hazard systems have been put in place in its production process. Actually, private standards are often necessary to fill in the lack of public standards in the fulfilment of market requirements. Moreover, they often are a tool to reach a market differentiation based upon both product quality and food safety.
Referring to the existing certification in the Belgian supply chain Vuylsteke et al group them in three categories that can be considered as suitable for the wider European context:
¾ Buyers’ norm: standards imposed on farmers by distributors and processors. This type of standardisation provides usually a limited support framework and leaves few possibilities for personal initiatives of farmers;
¾ Chain norm: standards demanded by market intermediaries. The goal is, generally, to reach an integrated management of the production and the marketing phases. In this case the support given to farmers is usually greater;
¾ Labels and hallmarks: in this type of initiatives the membership of farmers is generally undertaken without any imposition.
Paragraph 2.3 ALTERNATIVE FOOD SUPPLY CHAINS
IN A CHANGING CONTEXT
From the previous paragraphs, we can conclude that a new type of organisation, characterised by a vertical coordination, is occurring in the agro-food system and this is changing the relationship between the different actors in the supply chain. This change is leading to a rift between the farmers who participate in standardisation and the non-participating ones who generally tend to be older, with less formal education and out of professional networks and associations (Vuylsteke et al, 2005).
Several authors (Murdoch et al, 2000; Marsden et al, 2000b, Tovey, 1997) have identified the big retailer companies as power holders in terms of definition of quality criteria, and that is mainly because they manage the marketing of the products and the communication with consumers. On the light of these observations, we cannot deny that the survival of alternative food supply chains passes through the reappropriation of these two phases by producers.
We have already illustrated that alternative food supply chains can take many forms, but three main characteristics often occur: typical production (related to the territory), face-to-face interaction between producer and consumer and organic production. In this paragraph, we are going to examine more thoroughly these quality attributes, as they are useful for a clear comprehension of the case studies that will be investigated in the Comparative Analysis Chapter.
2.3.1 Typical productions
The literature on rural development is very rich of references about agro-food products with particular characteristics relating to territory. There is a wide range of terms used, such as “typical products” (Arfini and Mora, 1998), “origin labelled products” (Barjolle and Sylvander, 1999), “traditional foods” (Bessière, 1998; Amilien, 1999; Roest de and Menghi, 2000), “regional speciality products” (Treagear et al., 1998; Ilbery and Kneafsey 2000 a and b), “artisanal products” (Kupiec and Revell, 1998) and “special quality” or “quality farm” products (Murdoch, et al, 2000; Verhaegen and Van Huylenbroeck, 2001). However, shared
meanings have emerged regarding the properties of these products and their contribution to the economic development of rural areas. Examples of socio-economic benefits that are attributed to typical products are an increased farmers’ income, an improvement of the economic condition of the rural areas involved through a synergy effect (Brunori and Rossi, 2000), an enhanced skilled employment (Ventura and Milone, 2000), an enhanced social vibrancy (Ray, 1998), an improved environmental sustainability and animal welfare, and finally, safer, healthier food for the consumers (Nygard and Storstad, 1998).
The emergence of typical produce in recent years is considered to be a new trend in “countertendency” (Murdoch et al, 2000) and antithetical to predominant forces of internationalisation, industrialisation and free market capitalism that are threatening the existence and integrity of small scale agriculture (Bérard and Marchenay, 1995; van der Ploeg et al, 2000, Ventura and Milone, 2000).
To better understand this new phenomenon it could be useful to take into examination the analysis of the links between food and territory from Tregear in her “From Stilton to Vimto: using food history to re-think typical products in rural development” (2003). She hereby identifies three periods with typical characteristics.
¾ The pre-industrial era (XV-XIX century): this first period is characterised by the necessity of self-sufficiency in production which leads to the development of typical customs for processing raw materials in different geographical areas. In the 15th century, international trade already existed and this introduced
new raw materials to areas that today might be considered indigenous (e.g. tomatoes in Italy), but for the bulk of population in Europe, the diet in the pre-industrial era was generally monotonous. In powerful elites, the choice for extra-local food was a tool to demonstrate social welfare, “as these demonstrate power and wealth more explicitly”;
¾ The industrial era (XIX-XX century): this is the period in which the above mentioned socio-cultural forces and trends expand and intensify. In agricultural production, standardisation, mechanisation, intensification, and the application of new knowledge in science permeate the ordinary practices, threatening the existence of small-scale, territorially differentiated
agriculture. The industrial era is also associated with rural exodus that created a “delocalisation” between food production and consumption (Pelto and Pelto, 1983) and the loss of self-sufficiency. These trends also extended to the processing level, leading to the consumption of increasingly treated food. By the time, during the 19th century, the necessity in specifying the
identity of their produce was born in farmers and the concept of typicity was born;
¾ The post-industrial era (XX-XXI century): after the two World Wars, food supply security was a necessity, which was pushing upon the agricultural production efficiency. The women’s new role in the world of labour influenced the demand for new types of food (e.g. processed foods) and stores, which lead to the emergence of supermarkets. At the same time, food and diet became entwined with body image (Montanari, 1994; Bell and Valentine, 1997). As Treagear asserts, “the recent past presents a destructive combination of forces in terms of close food-territory links”. It is just in the recent two decades that the revalorisation of typical products and the reconnection between food production and consumption have acquired value in Europe. There is concordance among researchers on the consumption significance of typical products: the nostalgic desires of urban people to return to rural roots (Montanari, 1994; Bessière, 1998), the need of an alternative set of production and exchange values (Terrio, 1996) and the offer of a moral anchor in the post-industrial world (Warde, 1997; Amilien, 1999). Whilst in the previous era rustic food symbolically represented a low social status, the post-industrial era is characterised by a revival of these products. Within this topic, Montanary’s (1994) statement is remarkable: “only a wealthy society can afford to appreciate poverty”.
On end, it could be interesting to revise Tregear’s classification regarding typical products in the UK in this thesis. This classification, considered to be alternative, will be used in the further text, because it is based upon the historical development of food-territory links, taking the parts that can be considered as concerning the whole European situation.
¾ Classic typical products: they refer to the classic conceptualisation of typical products and are characterised by small-scale, artisan-based agrarian production, that is organised on a collective basis and produced with local raw materials;
¾ Appropriations: they refer to present day products with territorial associations. The producers are the remaining small-scale operators who found a strategy to survive in a sector that once contained many suppliers. As Tregear underlines “appropriation refers both to the status of credibility and legitimacy conferred upon the remaining producers to deliver the typical product, and also to their tendency to personify and take ownership of the territory name as their product brand name”;
¾ Re-inventions: they refer to products created or re-created in recent decades and whose properties are related to local raw materials or to local techniques of production. The revival of these productions has been stimulated by the recent revalorisation of typical products and the intrinsic, symbolic value that they currently have;
¾ Industrial other: this type of product has its origin in pre-industrial traditions, but they became identifiable, branded products through industrial production processes. This category is an expression of the industrialisation of some production processes and also of the association of typical products with urbanity rather than rurality.
2.3.2 Face-to-face initiatives
As already stated in the first chapter, the food scares have led to a strong consumers’ mistrust in the agro-food system and to an increasing demand for local products. Moreover, a sense of ‘nostalgia’ has been detected in a growing part of consumers by some authors (Holloway and Kneafsey, 2000; Ilbery and Kneafsey, 2000a). There is an emergent “food elite” within consumers who are seeking food products that can be bought directly from producers (Holloway and Kneafsey, 2000). The face-to-face initiatives have to be considered as a valid response to this new attitude. As Granovetter states, social relations can alter the nature of transactions between individuals through “generating trust and discouraging
malfeasance”, in particular where there is direct and ongoing interaction between the participants involved (Granovetter, 1985).
Face-to-face activities can be divided in two main groups: direct selling at the farm gate and farmers’ markets (FMs). In these realities, the emphasis is mainly detectable on the concept of localness, but also other characteristics, such as organic method and animal welfare, can be associated to these productions. The quality features that can be noticed in face-to-face initiatives involve several aspects. To sum up, we can state that two principal quality characteristics can encounter in these situation: localised origin and the re-construction of trust through a direct contact between producers and consumers. As Kirwan (2004) states, the intention is to create alterity within the food system by re-spatialising food through insisting that it is locally produced, and re-socialising food by ensuring there is direct contact between the producers and consumers concerned.
To better understand the nature of face-to-face initiatives, Avner Offer (1997) introduces the notion of ‘regard’. This term is used to express that there is more that the mere economic aspect thanks to the personal interactions involved in face-to-face experiences. The economic aspect is still important, but in addition there is the “satisfaction of regard”, which consists in the creation and maintenance of personal relationships, cemented through mutual responses, such as reputation, friendship, sociability, respect, attention, and intimacy. Regard is not in itself commercial, and indeed it is in danger of being devalued. Where it happens, Offer describes it as “pseudo-regard”, whereby consumers feel that they are not being treated as an individual (Offer, 1997). The risk is to judge face-to-face interactions as commercial initiatives based just upon commodity relationship, without considering what constitutes their alterity.
Drawing on the work of Offer, Lee (2000) extends the notion of “regard” to include impersonal relationships in his examination of small-scale horticultural nurseries. He reviews the creation of use values by the participants “through a form of mutually recognised reciprocity”, which includes “enjoyment and fulfilment in the transmission and extension of knowledge as well as in the products to which the knowledge [was] attached”. More recently, Sage (2003) has utilised the notion of ‘regard’ to asses the durability of an alternative ‘good food’ network in south-west Ireland that is based upon a set of shared ethical values incorporating animal welfare, sustainable production methods, and a sense of locality.
Several studies, conducted through personal interviews and survey have highlighted the principal participants’ motivations. The consumer is involved in this type of interaction because of the intrinsic quality of the produce available; he supports retail outlets different from the “domineering” corporate retailers; the direct contact with producers; the expectation to receive good value for their money, even if price is generally not the principal consideration; the feeling to be more connected with the food they buy; and finally, the more sociable and enjoyable shopping experience.
Although the possibility to talk to producers is not considered as a guarantee of the product quality by consumers, it enables the consumer to make a personal judgement as to its trustworthiness. In fact, consumers appreciate the producer’s personal integrity and they often buy produce from those producers they like and trust as people. The producers are generally aware that many of their consumers are looking for a more personal relationship at FMs, which can lead to a sense of mutual loyalty.
Shopping at a FM or a farm gate is viewed as a co-operative venture by some consumers, who want personally reward the effort that producers make to provide them “high quality” food.
Producers motivations to engage in face-to-face initiatives are primarily economical as they now obtain a full retail price for their produce and they can maximise the value added potential; but they furthermore have the control of their produce until its final point of sale; they can provide a legitimacy for the production methods employed; and many producers also mention the enjoyment of selling.
Undoubtedly, it is primarily for commercial reasons that producers undertake these experiences, whereas for consumers it is the availability of what they perceived to be high quality produce. Yet, there is also evidence of a mutual intention of support an exchange context that is distinctive from supermarkets, in which both of them can regain some control over their respective roles within the food system.
Because of their general success, face-to-face activities are often subjected to external pressures by political institutions, which want to exploit their economic performances and increase their scope to contribute to the economic development of rural areas. Moreover, some consumers are increasingly demanding a wider availability of products. The degree of processing that should be allowed for
