Coffee, tea or soda? Romania’s favorite non-alcoholic drink

According to different market studies, Romanians drink coffee on a daily basis, only sip tea on occasion and indulge on soda frequently.

Coffee

On average, Romanians drink half a cup of coffee every day, Mondelez reports. By comparison, the Dutch cannot survive without at least two and a half cups of java-juice for their daily consumption.

Still, coffee consumption in Romania is on the rise, from 2.23 million kg. in 2010 to 2.39 million kilograms last year. Romania imports over 40.000 tons of coffee anually, and the market is valued at USD 100 million, writes wall-street.ro.

Tea

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Romania doesn’t have a tea-drinking tradition like other countries, namely Russia, Poland, UK or Turkey, and it is thought of more as a remedy than a desired drink.

“Tea consumption is very reduced in Romania, compared to neighbouring countries and to the european average. If Russians and Pols drink 50 to 70 litres of tea every year, Romanians barely drink 3 litres yearly“, according to Daniel Barbulescu, Foods&IceCream marketing manager at Unilever, quoted by incomemagazine.ro.

The overall value of the tea market in Romania in 2012 was EUR 23 million.

Soft drinks

A Romanian buys on average over 55 litres of soda in one year, which is abysmal compared to the 170 litres purchased by an American, according to data pooled by Euromonitor.

Still, the Romanian soft drinks market had total revenues of USD 1.8bn in 2011, representing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 0.8% between 2007 and 2011.