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Which U.S. president first presented to Congress what became known as the Consumer Bill of Rights?

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consumer

American  

[kuhn-soo-mer] / kənˈsu mər /

noun

consumers plural

1. a person or thing that consumes.

2. Economics. a person or organization that uses a commodity or service.

3. Ecology. an organism, usually an animal, that feeds on plants or other animals.

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consumer British  

/ kənˈsjuːmə /

noun

1. a person who acquires goods and services for his or her own personal needs Compare producer

2. a person or thing that consumes

3. (usually plural) ecology an organism, esp an animal, within a community that feeds upon plants or other animals See also decomposer producer

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consumer Scientific  

/ kən-so̅o̅′mər /

1. A heterotrophic organism that feeds on other organisms in a food chain.

2. ◆ Herbivores that feed on green plants and detritivores that feed on decaying matter are called primary consumers. Carnivores that feed on herbivores or detritivores are called secondary consumers, while those that feed on other carnivores are called tertiary consumers.

3. Compare producer

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consumer Cultural  

1. Someone who purchases a good for personal use.

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• anticonsumer
  noun
• consumership
  noun
• preconsumer
  noun
• nonconsumer
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• consumers
  plural

Etymology

Origin of consumer

First recorded in 1375–1425, for the earlier sense “squanderer,” 1525–35 for the current sense; Middle English; consume + -er ¹

Compare meaning

How does consumer compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

• consumer vs. capital goods

Explanation

A consumer is someone who buys or consumes, or uses up, something. An economy could not keep functioning without consumers. Long before smorgasbords, shopping malls, or eBay, people craved pretty and tasty things. So those who spoke Latin invented the word consumere, which meant to use up, eat, or waste. Being a consumer doesn't necessarily mean you are squandering. We're all consumers when we go through the checkout line at the grocery store, for instance.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

consumer consumers

The Bank of England Money and Credit report for June, which reveals a combination of consumer lending, mortgage lending and mortgage approvals for that month, is due on Wednesday.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026

Extra precautions around testing are important, he continued, because inconsistencies risk "making the consumer really wary that we don't have anybody to trust".

From BBC ● Jul. 24, 2026

Other data include preliminary durable goods figures for June on Monday, and the Conference Board’s consumer confidence reading for July on Tuesday.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026

“The ongoing uncertainty means that many households remain cautious about spending,” said Rolf Buerkl, head of consumer climate at NIM.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026

A year before, Frost might have done one billion-dollar deal each month; now he was doing twenty, all of them insuring putatively diversified piles of consumer loans.

From "The Big Short" by Michael Lewis

Vasilescu of BNP Paribas calls it the “microbrew effect”: Chinese consumers are chasing new flavors.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026

However, TerraCycle, which involves consumers collecting packaging and sending it to be recycled, only runs the BuzzBallz scheme in the United States.

From BBC ● Jul. 24, 2026

“Convergence” is the hot buzzword in telecommunications these days, as companies see opportunities to sell consumers on a bundled suite of offerings.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 24, 2026

“This transaction is good for competition, good for consumers, and good for creators,” Paramount said Friday, adding the “plaintiffs’ market definitions bear no relationship to the realities of today’s marketplace and cannot withstand scrutiny.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026

That fulfills part of our definition of plant domestication, as the genetic modification of an ancestral plant in ways that make it more useful to consumers.

From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond

Related Words

• buyer
• customer
• purchaser
• shopper
• user