Alessandro Bonadonna

Street food and innovation: the food truck phenomenon

The purpose of this paper is to focus on food truck phenomenon, a particular kind of street food service, identifying two categories of performers: “Traditional Food Truck” (TFT) and “Gourmet Food Truck” (GFT). This paper evaluates and compares the efficiency performance of the main actors.,A sample of 41 food trucks in the Northwest of Italy was identified. A survey was carried out to determine the characteristics of the food truck and evaluate the efficiency performance of an output-oriented data envelopment analysis.,The two kinds of food trucks provide different levels of efficacy: the data showed that 22 per cent of the food trucks operate efficiently with an average efficiency score of 0.80. The results demonstrate that GFT are more efficient than TFT and confirm that innovation is an important key to competitive advantage in this sector.,The data collected were related only to the food truckers that operate in the Turin area and the number of variables analysed is limited to certain aspects of production and selling processes.,The results provided some managerial indicators to improve the level of corporate efficiency, operating on technical decisions.,This is a pioneer study that analyses how a business based on the combination of tradition and innovation can offer a competitive advantage and strengthen a strong connection to its territory, improving corporate performance.

Labelling and sustainability in the green food economy: Perception among millennials with a good cultural background

European consumers are more and more showing the desire to evaluate how food products are sustainable in all their different aspects (environmental, social and economic) through the acquisition of various fundamentals like the origin of products or the distribution channels. Food operators try communicating different meanings of the sustainability idea to final consumers by integrating into labels information underlining some specificities of the production cycle, in order to evaluate potential environmental impacts. In this context, the present study aims at identifying - using a sample survey - students’ perception of the concept of sustainability and of the related labels used to communicate it. The results highlight that these instruments have reached the goal only in part. Il consumatore dell’Unione europea manifesta sempre di piu il desiderio di valutare la sostenibilita dei prodotti alimentari nelle sue diverse declinazioni attraverso l’acquisizione di elementi come l’origine degli alimenti o la valutazione dei sistemi distributivi. Gli operatori del settore alimentare comunicano i diversi significati del termine sostenibilita al consumatore finale, attraverso l’inserimento in etichetta di informazioni che sottolineano alcune peculiarita del ciclo produttivo del prodotto per valutarne gli eventuali impatti. Questo lavoro si pone come obiettivo quello di individuare, attraverso una indagine campionaria, la percezione che gli studenti universitari piemontesi hanno del concetto di sostenibilita e delle relative labels utilizzate per comunicarla. I risultati ottenuti sottolineano che tali strumenti solo in parte hanno raggiunto gli obiettivi prefissati.

Food and Wine Tourism in the Langa del Barolo: Survey on Restaurant Offer

This paper reports on wine and food tourism in the territory of Langa del Barolo, one of the excellent areas included in the «Vineyard Landscape of Piedmont». Indeed, Langhe-Roero and Monferrato, are the first Italian vineyard landscapes on Unescos «World Heritage List». The study investigated into the perception restaurant managers have, as main stakeholders of food and wine tourism, of the initiatives and valorisation tools implemented on the territory. Our data showed that these tools are appreciated and accepted at different levels. Moreover, it was observed that «word of mouth» is not only still present, but is also very relevant, both in its local and traditional form and, above all, in its electronic form, through the use of social media that is able to reach and interact with tourists the world over.