In 2025 organic retail flies to €4.4bn in Italy (+9.2%). Wines and sparkling wines steady (-0.1%)

When shopping at the supermarket, Italy shows a “green heart”, demonstrating a growing focus on sustainability. Not surprisingly, in 2025 the value of purchases of organic products in the retail channel reached 4.44 billion euros, with growth of +9.2% (corresponding to 376 million euros in absolute terms) compared to 2024. This is the highest result of the last five-year period, excluding the exceptional year of the pandemic (2020), with a positive trend for almost all categories. However, this doesn’t include the wine and sparkling wine segment, which in 2025 recorded -0.1% in value and -1.9% in volume, followed by meats, vegetable oils and fats, and cured meats. The “organic” share of wine and sparkling wine accounts for 1.8% of the total agri-food sector and represents 1.3% of the value of the organic shopping basket. This is the snapshot provided by the report “Organic: household food purchases”, curated by Ismea, which highlights a growing attachment of Italians to organic products.
Already in 2024, the share of spending on organic products in total agri-food expenditure had shown an initial encouraging signal (+0.1 percentage points compared to 2023), which strengthened in 2025 with an increase of 0.4 percentage points, reaching 4%. Overall, most sectors recorded an increase in purchases in value terms, with particularly significant growth in milk and dairy products (+17.7%), eggs (+14.9%), other food products (+10%), and fruit (+9.3%). By contrast, for the third consecutive year there was a contraction in purchases in value in the cured meats (-15.6%) and meat (-10.9%) sectors. This trend is even more evident in terms of volumes (-18.7% for cured meats and -17.4% for meat) and is partly attributable to rising prices for some items, with peaks of +28.1% for beef and +11.2% for cured ham, which negatively affected demand in 2025.
The organic shopping cart also recorded a reduction in spending for the vegetable oils and fats category (-11.6%), after a 2024 marked by particularly strong growth (+31.6%), also due to a drop in average shelf prices, which fell by 3.3% compared to the previous year. In terms of volumes purchased, there was a widespread increase across categories, with more significant changes for fresh eggs (+9%), vegetables (+8.8%), milk and dairy products (+8.2%), and other food products (+8.2%).
Overall, analyzed data suggests a phase of greater solidity in demand for organic products, in which value growth is not driven exclusively by price dynamics but also by a stronger consumer inclination to choose organic products at the time of purchase.
In 2025, the comparison between the organic market and the total agri-food market shows differentiated dynamics among the main product categories. Organic products show stronger spending growth in several key sectors, particularly milk and dairy products (+17.7% organic and +5.9% total agri-food), vegetables (+6.9% organic and +1% total agri-food), fruit (+9.3% organic and +2.7% total agri-food), and other food products (+10% organic vs. +6.3% total agri-food). However, wine and sparkling wine remain an exception (-0.1% and +1.6% total agri-food), while positive trends are also observed in organic honey, eggs, and cereal-based products, confirming a more favorable dynamic than overall spending and indicating a reversal compared to 2024, when they had recorded a decline of -0.4%. For non-alcoholic beverages and fish products, there is growth in purchase value in both segments, although increases are higher in the total agri-food sector than in organic. Diverging dynamics are seen in the meat and cured meats sectors, with negative changes in organic and positive ones in total agri-food. For vegetable oils and fats, spending declined in both segments, slightly more in organic, in a context of reduced average shelf prices for this category (-3.3% compared to 2024).
Over the past 4 years, explains the report, the composition of the organic food shopping cart has remained largely stable, with a consistent concentration of sales value in the fruit and vegetable sector, which in 2025 accounts for 42.7%. In detail, the fruit and vegetable sector confirms the positive performance of the “vegetables, legumes, and potatoes” category, with an overall increase of 8.8% in purchased volumes, driven mainly by sales of potatoes (+13% in value and +14.3% in volume) and legumes (+11.1% in value and +14.5% in volume), also aided by slight price decreases in both segments (-1.2% and -2.9% respectively). Fruit, which represents 24.2% of the value of the organic cart, saw total spending rise by 9.3% in 2025, largely supported by the favorable performance of citrus fruits (+12% in value and +8.3% in volume), in a context of a 2.9% annual increase in average prices in the sector. This is followed by dairy products (24.3%), which over the past three years have progressively increased their share of the organic shopping receipt, reaching their highest level in 2025, driven mainly by sales of fresh cheeses (+16.7% in value) and hard cheeses (+11.1% in value), alongside an 8.7% increase in prices for the sector.
In 2025, supermarkets confirmed their role as the main purchasing channel for organic products, with revenues close to 1.65 billion euros and an increase of nearly 172 million euros compared to 2024 (+11.7%). Growth is mainly driven by increased spending in the dairy sector (+70.2 million euros) and fresh products, particularly fruit (+39.7 million euros) and vegetables (+31.5 million euros). This is followed by traditional retail, which, after several years of declining sales of organic products, showed a reversal in 2025 with revenue increasing by over 113 million euros (+13.4%). This trend is partly attributable to reduced customer loyalty toward large-scale retail chains overall.
In fact, there is a growing diversification of purchasing behavior, with wider use of distribution channels aimed at simultaneously seeking quality and convenience. This evolution is reflected both in increased purchase frequency and in reallocation dynamics among channels, with a recovery in the share of traditional retail and a simultaneous contraction in self-service formats. The latter recorded a decrease in organic-related spending, with negative effects on organic revenues, which fell by around 700,000 euros compared to the previous year. Compared to 2024, the discount channel showed a slowdown, with a more limited increase in organic sales in 2025 (48.4 million euros against 74.1 million euros in 2024). Finally, the positive trend of hypermarkets continues, reaching “organic revenues” of 879 million euros, 5.1% compared to the previous year.