Evaluation of the effects of changes in regulatory policies on consumers perception: the case of designations of origin in the wine common market organisation

The paper analyses how different aspects connected with regulations can influence the consumers’ quality perception and the value that consumers attribute to the wine sector products. In particular, aspects concerning labelling and presentation of designations of origin, which, in turn, mirror different regulations of production methods, are considered. Consumers’ preference can allow enterprises to complying with more restrictive rules and sustain higher costs for differentiate their products and achieve higher quality. When choosing a product, consumers do not evaluate each single quality factor but the product as a whole, therefore the analysis has to be done with a methodology considering both the combination of all characteristics of the product, and the contribution of every factor to the creation of value for consumers. For this reason the value that consumers attribute to different characteristics is evaluated through an experimental economic analysis applying the method of the Conjoint analysis.