Consumer organizations are advocacy groups that seek to protect people from corporate abuse like unsafe products, predatory lending, false advertising, astroturfing and pollution.
Consumer Organizations may operate via protests, litigation, campaigning, or lobbying. They may engage in single-issue advocacy (e.g., the British Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA), which campaigned against keg beer and for cask ale) or they may set themselves up as more general consumer watchdogs, such as the Consumers' Association in the UK.
One common means of providing consumers useful information is the independent comparative survey or test of products or services, involving different manufacturers or companies (e.g., Which?, Consumer Reports, etc.).
Another arena where consumer organizations have operated is food safety. The needs for campaigning in this area are less easy to reconcile with their traditional methods, since the scientific, dietary or medical evidence is normally more complex than in other arenas, such as the electric safety of white goods. The current standards on mandatory labelling, in developed countries, have in part been shaped by past lobbying by consumer groups.
The aim of consumer organizations may be to establish and to attempt to enforce consumer rights. Effective work has also been done, however, simply by using the threat of bad publicity to keep companies' focus on the consumers' point of view.
Consumer organizations may attempt to serve consumer interests by relatively direct actions such as creating and/or disseminating market information, and prohibiting specific acts or practices, or by promoting competitive forces in the markets which directly or indirectly affect consumers (such as transport, electricity, communications, etc.).
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History
Two precursor organizations to the modern consumer organization are standards organizations and consumers leagues. Both of these appeared in the United States around 1900.
Trade associations and professional societies began to establish standards organizations to reduce industry waste and increase productivity. Consumer leagues modeled themselves after trade unions in their attempts to improve the market with boycotts in the same way that trade unions sought to improve working conditions with strike action.
Consumer organizations by country
International consumer organizations
Consumers International - International NGO
ANEC (Europe; focus on standardization)
BEUC (Europe; French: Bureau Européen des Unions de Consommateurs)
ICRT The only independent international organization for consumer research and testing
National organizations
Consumers' Federation of Australia
Australian Consumers Association
Consumer Watchdog
Consumers' Association of Canada
Consumers Council of Canada
Option consommateurs
Consumer Council of Fiji
Fiji Consumers Association
Association de défense d'éducation et d'information du consommateur (ADEIC)
Association Contre les Abus des Banques Européennes (ACABE)
Association Force ouvrière des consommateurs (AFOC)
Association Léo-Lagrange de défense du consommateur (ALLDC)
Confédération générale du logement (CGL)
Confédération nationale du logement (CNL)
Association pour l'information et la défense des consommateurs salariés (Indecosa-CGT)
Confédération nationale des associations familiales catholiques (CNAFC)
Conseil national des associations familiales laïques (CNAFAL)
Confédération syndicale des familles (CSF)
Consommation Logement Cadre de vie (CLCV)
Consumer magazines
By 1969 most capitalist countries with developed marketplaces hosted consumer organizations that published consumer magazines which reported the results of product testing. Internationally, the idea of consumer organizations spread from Consumers Union in the United States starting in 1956. The growth of interest in product testing journalism might be explained by increased consumption of mass-marketed products in and before that period. That increased international consumption itself was an effect of the aftermath of World War II.
In the 25 years after World War II, there was a correlation between the number of people in a country who were purchasing cars and the popularity of consumer magazines. In some cases, an increase in other consumer purchases seemed to drive popularity of consumer magazines, but the correlation was closest for populations who made decisions about buying cars. The availability of consumer magazines comforted consumers when individuals in society suddenly became overwhelmed with marketplace decisions, and the popularity of magazines seemed to grow as more marketplace decisions became available.