Processing companies' preferences for attributes of beef in Switzerland

The aim of this work was to assess processing companies' preferences for attributes of Swiss beef. To this end, qualitative interviews were used to derive product attributes that determine the buying decision. Through an adaptive-choice based conjoint analysis survey and latent class analysis of choice data, we compute class preferences. Results show that there are two distinct classes. A smaller class emphasizes traceability back to the birth farm and low producer price, a larger class focuses on environmental effects and origin. Additionally we see that larger companies are more price-sensitive and smaller companies are more sensitive to origin of the animals. The results outlined in this paper may be used to target market segments and to derive differentiation strategies based on product characteristics.