What the consumer told us is: 'We don't want to come to pump gas and watch television.

It's not that consumers won't tell you what's on their minds.

"In the end, consumers will tell us which one works for them," he continued.

A marketer does something and a consumer tells five or ten friends.

Then, publicly reward cooperating companies so that consumers can tell which are their products.

"The risk is that the consumer will tell you what they really think," he said.

Indeed, numerous experts doubt that consumers can tell the difference anymore between American and foreign products.

"On the search engines, consumers can't tell these links apart."

Dairy technology has advanced to a point that consumers often can't tell the difference.

"In many cases, consumers have told us the store had just one."