Price determinants of italian extra-virgin olive oil: a hedonic price approach in Biotechnology and quality of olive tree products around the Mediterranean basin

Consumers ofindustrialized countries are nowadays more concerned with the extra-virgin olive oil quality issue, especially due to an increasing awareness of the higher nutritional properties found on special products in comparison with standard oil,for which they are willing to pay a premium price. In this paper we adapt a hedonic price function, firstly proposed by Lancaster (1960) and Rosen (1974), with the purpose of estimating the impacts on price of the following attributes: specification of taste and organic processing, bottle size, designation of origin, and trademark. Analysis is based on AC-Nielsen Homescan Consumer Panel data (2002-2004), on 930 references. Ourfindings show that organic product, designation of origin, andsmall size bottles are highly appreciated by consumers. On the contrary, taste and name brand are less important.