Inflation affects us even in the most intimate and private aspects of our lives. The demonstration comes from recent research carried out by the Crc (Centre for training and research on consumption) which processed the data published by the Mimit Observatory, comparing the prices of toilet paper in 2021 and today.
Over a third of an increase
It turns out that, in Turin and its province alone, this type of product has seen its price increase by more than a third (+34.3%). Although the Italian average is even worse. In fact, if in the shadow of the Mole we went from an average price of 1.78 to 2.39 euros, in Italy the increase was as much as 44%.
A pack of 4 rolls cost on average 1.74 euros in Italy in 2021, while today, for the same pack, you spend an average of 2.51 euros. In detail, it turns out that Bolzano is the Italian city where toilet paper costs the most (3.40 euros for a pack of 4 rolls), followed by Grosseto (3.15 euros), Udine (3.06 euros) and Trento ( 3.03).
On the other side of the ranking is Syracuse, with an average price of 1.77 euros: the cheapest province in Italy. Followed by Bari (1.81 euros) and then Mantua (1.87 euros). In total only 6 cities boast a price lower than 2 euros for a pack of 4 rolls.
If we analyze the trend of retail prices between 2021 and 2024, it emerges that the heaviest price increases are recorded in Grosseto and Ferrara, with a change in prices exceeding +89%, +85% in Bolzano, Udine and Livorno. The provinces where toilet paper increased the least in the three-year period are Messina (+14.5%), Bari (+15.3%) and Vercelli (+17.3%).
Other Piedmontese
If you look for the other provinces of Piedmont, you discover that in Biella the price has grown by 50.2%, in Cuneo by almost 58, in Novara by over 47, in Alessandria by 44.
“It is estimated that the toilet paper market in Italy is worth around 1.2 billion euros per year – states the president of the Crc scientific committee, Furio Truzzi –. A good so indispensable for Italians that, as you will remember, during the pandemic it was one of the first to disappear from supermarket shelves, with citizens purchasing large stocks of this good. There are several factors weighing on the price increases: first of all the crisis of raw materials, with the war in Ukraine which led to a collapse in imports of wood from Russia from which the cellulose essential for producing toilet paper is obtained, and the consequent rise in international short fiber prices, which rose by 68% in January compared to pre-price increases. Then there are the higher production costs determined by the high energy costs that have weighed on the industries of the sector, and last but not least the usual speculation which, as is known, has the greatest impact on the prices of those goods that citizens cannot do without”.
