Consumer Attitude Document, released by the Coffee Board as a referral record to boost local coffee consumption, revealed interesting trends related to coffee and tea drinking habits in India.
The document, which was jointly prepared by S Radhakrishnan, deputy director of Coffee Board (market research) and Babu Reddy, an agricultural economist in the board, contained study conducted in urban locations across the country and rural areas in South India. According to study, both coffee and tea enjoy high spontaneous recall rate of 81% and 95% respectively followed by plain milk and carbonated soft drinks.
In Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, where the country?s 85% of coffee is planted, the percentage of consumers who drink coffee for more than two times a day are higher than in other regions. There is 33% of this group in rural areas while there is only 28% who drink coffee as frequently in urban areas.
Tea emerged as a regularly consumed beverage. Tea is far more a regular beverage among regular coffee drinkers in rural Tamil Nadu than in urban areas of the state. In rural AP and Kerala, tea is a first choice beverage among a larger chunk of regular coffee drinkers. Future consideration of coffee is low among non-drinkers of coffee in three traditional southern states of AP, Karnataka, and Tamil Nadu.
Coffee enjoys ?Family Beverage? status in Karnataka while it shares importance with tea in AP, where tea is considered mainly as an evening drink.
Barring Karnataka, a larger chunk of population in other southern states uses instant coffee despite having awareness on filter coffee. Instant coffee dominates with 34% in Tamil Nadu, 30% in Karnataka, 20% in AP and 16% in Kerala.
In Tamil Nadu, 70% of consumer drink chicory coffee but only 55% has awareness on chicory where in Karnataka, of the total 66% of chicory coffee drinkers, only 44% know about chicory. In AP too, of the 59% of chicory coffee drinkers, only 27% has knowledge on chicory. But in North, of the total 29% of chicory coffee consumers only 1% know about chicory.
