When stepping to the milk case, we all have preferences that weigh heavily on our selections. The same is true across the globe.
The Chinese market is one that saw tremendous growth through the early part of the century and has dealt with its fair share of safety scares related to milk. Ultra-high temperature (UHT) pasteurization products are common on Chinese grocer shelves, being more affordable than shorter shelf-life options. In fact, an estimated 60 percent of ready-to-drink milk is long shelf-life milk.
All this leads to interesting selection dynamics for the Chinese consumer.
In a recent small-scale study comparing taste and labeling preferences of Chinese and Australian consumers, Chinese milk drinkers indicated they preferred the taste of UHT pasteurized milk over the taste of shorter shelf-life pasteurized milk, but they generally had a higher liking for any milk labeled "short shelf-life milk."
Conversely, Australian consumers preferred the taste of short shelf-life milk but showed no favoritism based on the labels "short shelf-life" or "long shelf-life."
Chinese consumers also considered short shelf-life milk as safer than UHT milk, and both Chinese and Australian milk drinkers considered milk produced in China as generally less safe than any milk labeled "produced in Australia."
c) Hoard's Dairyman Intel 2016
February 29, 2016
