Re: Is the Molson’s (Canadian) beer sold in the U.S. watered down? - The Straight Dope
The letter didn’t say where in the US they moved to-- if they moved to Utah, they could very well be experiencing watered-down beer. An important detail the response leaves out.
Haha replying to myself, I posted that, then glanced back at the article and it says they were writing from Chicago. Oops! Sorry.
Strictly speaking, it’s probably not “watered down”. I suspect that the major breweries that sell to the US brew a couple of versions of their beers- one for the relatively normal jurisdictions, and one for the ones that require 3.2 beer.
They likely just brew the 3.2 one to a lower gravity; it’s actually cheaper to do that than to take normal beer and add water to it. Otherwise they’d have to brew a special short batch to water down to get back to the original volume.
Normally I could buy this, but adding water, which is basically free, to your end product to increase it’s volume sounds like a capitalist dream cum true 
I wouldn’t think so either. O’Douls sure doesn’t taste like real beer, but neither does it taste watery.
You’d think so, but bump is correct. The way the system is set up, it’s easier and cheaper to just brew a special 3.2 batch from the start rather than “water down” the regular beer. They also adjust the malt bill and hopping schedule to keep the beer balanced at the lower alcohol level. Remember, a low alcohol beer doesn’t necessarily mean a low flavor beer. Guinness is much lower in alcohol than people think.
Guinness = 4.2%
Budweiser = 5%
Thats why Guinness tastes like a packet of old powdered chocolat milk mix mixed with water.