Global Marketing Strategy: Diffusion of the Italian Slow Food Movement in Japan

Chapter 1
1.1 Introduction
Slow Food Movement was born in the North-West of Italy, in Bra, in 1986, 
developing from the already existing Arci Gola Association. The organization has 
reached the international level in twenty years, promoting projects about local consume 
and protection for those food species endangered by new production techniques which 
are damaging the environment.
Slow Food aims to educate consumers about the importance of food and the 
value they may loose because of the way the society is developing. This concept 
suggests their position against Fast Food chains, but members argue that it is not the 
only theme the association in focusing on.
It is important to remark that Slow Food is not promoting Italian cuisine at an 
international level, but gastronomic cultures of every nation. Of course, the Italian 
image has contributed in promoting the movement, but only at the beginning. Spreading 
at an international level, Slow Food has succeeded in reaching a proper autonomy from 
Italy and its country image.
Many critiques have been moved to the association. For instance, Slow Food has 
been considered a political organization, which is not really focusing its attention on the 
Earth's needs keeping close to consumers as its message promotes; it may be close to 
the government, instead. Moreover, Slow Food products have been evaluated as 
prestigious, meaning that they are expensive, a luxury brand for a limited and elitist 
group of people. Furthermore, Slow Food would not promote originality as a way to 
protect biodiversity, but this emphasis on value and uniqueness has been seen as a 
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strategy to raise the association brand, rather than a way to oppose globalization 
(Udagawa, 2008).
These kind of critiques represent the starting point of this study about Slow Food 
diffusion in Japan. In order to have a view of the situation as wide as possible, several 
themes have been analysed and three surveys have been held, as it will be explained in 
detail in the next paragraphs.
1.2 Research Question
The Research Question of the study is to understand whether or not Slow Food 
in presented and perceived as a new trend concerning Italian Food, rather than as an 
association which promotes local consume, traditional techniques and high quality 
products. To construct this hypothesis, several points have been analysed, dealing with 
Slow Food philosophy, media influence on consumers, stereotypes, consumers 
characteristics, desire and behaviours towards Italy.
1.3 Structure of the research
This study wants to understand how the Italian image held by people in Japan 
may influence perceptions and marketing strategies of the Slow Food Movement. 
In the second chapter existing literature has been analysed, in order to construct 
the hypothesis of the study. First, the Slow Food Movement, its history, aims, practical 
activities and internationalization process have been analysed. Secondly, the study 
points out media influence over society and consumers. Third theme of the literature 
review is the Italian image held by consumers in Japan: throughout the analysis of 
consumers characteristics and of the desire towards West and Western people, the 
research studies whether this perception may influence or not consumers' attitude 
towards the association.
In chapter three the methodology is explained. Using different modalities, three 
surveys have been held: the first one consists in the interview to Carlo Petrini, founder 
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of the association, to understand how Slow Food faces communication difficulties in 
spreading its message. Moreover, other representative members of the association have 
been interviewed to study Slow Food marketing campaign; the second survey consists 
in the analysis of journal articles edited by the Asahi Shinbun, aiming to examine media 
influence in promoting the association; the last one is an online internet survey, sent to 
Japanese people living in Japan. This has been the only necessary characteristic to 
answer the questionnaire. The reason why is that only with this kind of sample the 
expected results would have been achieved. In effect, studies about consumers 
characteristics which represent the basis of the study concern consumers in Japan: this is 
the reason for the choice of the sample, which is composed by 106 people 18-aged and 
over.
In chapter four gathered data are analysed. Chapter five explains findings. 
The birth of the association in Italy may represent the reason why of the 
possibility for it to be perceived as a new trend concerning Italian food, due to the 
presence of the generally shared country image this nation has. Finally, the study also 
argues implications and limits of the research. 
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Chapter 2 
Literature Review                                         Figure 1.1 Slow Food logo
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2.1 The Italian Slow Food Movement 
2.1.1 A historical overview 
The general description of Slow Food proposed in this study aims to emphasise 
the impossibility of making connections between the movement and fashion or trends; 
indeed, throughout the illustration of the Slow Food movement message essence, which 
pays attention to the global situation in order to save the world we are leaving in, the 
reader will be able to judge by himself if there could be any link between Slow Food 
and fashion.
Using Petrini's words to describe Slow Food is the best way to start approaching 
the movement.
Carlo Petrini, the founder of Slow Food, succeeded perfectly in depicting the 
aim of the association born in 1986 (Petrini, 2001).
The most basic is our conviction that alimentation is an essential part of life and that 
quality of life is therefore inevitably linked to the pleasure of eating in healthy, 
flavourful, and varied ways. This is the opposite of what fast food is selling, with its 
snacks and meals designed to be eaten hurriedly and distractedly, their only virtues their 
immediate recognizability (thanks to standardization) and low price (thanks to 
standardization and inferior quality). Slow food, on the other hand, means giving the act 
of nourishing oneself the importance it deserves, learning to take pleasure in the 
diversity of recipes and flavors, recognizing the variety of places where food is 
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Source: www.slowfood.it, referred on June 8th, 2014
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produced and the people who produce it, and respecting the rhythm of the seasons and 
of human gatherings. (Petrini, 2001, p. XVII)
The foundation of the association is used to be associated to the protesting 
movement towards the opening of the first McDonald's restaurant occurred in Rome.
The conquest of Rome in 1986 by McDonald's chain should be considered as the 
straw that broke the camel, not the event which led to the official foundation of Slow 
Food association which evolved from the already existing Arci Gola (Andrews, 2010; 
Sassatelli&Davolio, 2010). This previous organization was animated by a group of 
young people since the middle of the '70s, collected in Bra, a small city in Piedmont, in 
the North-West of Italy, a flourishing area for wine and cheese productions (Petrini, 
2001). In the same year others events contributed to the creation of the right situation 
which permitted Slow Food dawning: the nuclear disaster occurred in Chernobyl, the 
contamination of the aqueducts in the Po' valley and the case of contaminated wine in 
Narzole
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, a village next to Bra, reason why 19 people died in March 1986 (Andrews, 
2010; Petrini, 2013; Schneider, 2008). At the end of the year, the production and selling 
of wine in the region had suffered a 37% drop in expos and lost a quarter of the value 
for the entire industry (Petrini, 2013).
These negative occurrences improved the importance of the need for quality 
products and honesty towards consumers, which became the fields of action of Arci 
Gola, in order to recover consumers' confidence and make the image of the area raise 
again after the tragedy caused by wine contamination (Andrews, 2010; Schneider, 
2008). Even before the official foundation, Slow Food principal values and scopes were 
the same as the ones promoted today: quality and correctness towards consumers.
Analysing about the origin of the name, McDonald's case represents an 
important issue.
This research shares Slow Food vision and consideration about the diffusion of 
fast food restaurants as representative of traditional recipes and gastronomical 
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To make the alcoholic proof raise, wine producers added methyl alcohol, which contaminated the 
product.
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knowledge refuse, evidence of a general superficiality that succeeded in reaching even 
the food sphere (Andrews, 2010). This in the reason why, when McDonald was opening 
in Piazza di Spagna in Rome, Arcigola (which meanwhile had changed name unifying 
the two words) organized a manifestation towards the American giant and during this 
occasion the appellation “Slow Food” was used for the first time as a striking contrast 
against the fast food culture promoted. Petrini remarks on the efficacy of the two words, 
kept in English language (Petrini, 2006, p.73):
The choice to keep the phrase “Slow food” in its English-language form in Italy was an 
ingenious twist. Those two words, a reaction to the Big Mac phenomenon, became the 
best way to spread the group's philosophy. Another kind of food could exist, another 
way to eat, another way to comprehend the pleasures of life. (Petrini, 2006, p.73)
The sign of the Manifesto and the foundation of Slow Food Publishing 
represented an efficient way to spread internationally.
In December 1989, Slow Food was officially launched at the Opéra Comique in 
Paris, where delegations from around the world gathered together to sign Slow Food 
Manifesto. This act symbolised the official presentation of the movement at an 
international level.
Moreover, the birth of Slow Food Publishing in 1990 represented a powerful 
way to spread and diffuse the association message around the world. Thanks to guides 
such as Osterie d'Italia (Italian Taverns) published by the editor, the attention was 
focused on modest and traditional restaurants, rather than on those proclaimed by the 
Michelin guide: evidence of the will to avoid the journalistic conformity, in order to 
promote tradition (Petrini, 2001).
From 1990, in few years Slow Food succeeded in spreading around Europe and 
in the other continents promoting local food ways and cultures (Sassatelli&Davolio, 
2010) as an answer to globalization, a reverse trend which exalted the pleasure of the 
aesthetic values, contrasting with the modern busy life: still now, Slow Food promotes 
and represents the possibility of something different (Andrews, 2010).
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