Yea, but the baseline for that _type_ of beer is pretty low so the shittier ones in that part of the market can easily reach 3.5. Many of the fraternities at my (large, public) university would bulk-buy 2.5% beer.
This is in contrast to the baseline that the parents claim would imply, in a market supposedly "overwhelmingly" skewed towards stronger craft beer.
And what exactly were these 2.5% beers that your university's fraternities were buying? Can you provide a concrete example of these popular 2.5% beers available in bulk?
My mistake, I was just curious enough to double-check and it was 3.2% (low-point beer).
When you're supplying drinks for hundreds of random people, the volume starts to be a lot more important than the quality of the beer (or alcohol) itself. Everyone who lived in the frat had their own private stashes of better beer that they and their friends would drink from, and our private parties were better-supplied.
This is in contrast to the baseline that the parents claim would imply, in a market supposedly "overwhelmingly" skewed towards stronger craft beer.