Early Market Testing of Beverage Cans

Beer Can Magazine Advertisment from 1938

After American Can Company acquired the "Keglined" trademark in 1934, they were anxious to try their new punch top beverage can in the market place.

They spent three months of intense negotiations with the brewery of Gottfried Krueger of Newark, New Jersey to coach Krueger's Beer into the revolutionary new containers.

Krueger was very apprehensive about the test, but finally choose the outer limits of its distribution area for their product in a can. Richmond, Virginia was the city picked for the test, and on January 24, 1935, the first delivery of Krueger Cream Ale was received and exposed to the beer drinkers of Richmond.

Within a week, 47% of the distributors in Richmond were handling Krueger's canned beer. At the end of a month, no less than 84% of the distributors were handling it. In the next couple of months Krueger jarred the industry by taking large chunks of the business of the "big three" national brewers, Anheuser-Busch, Pabst, and Schlitz.

By June of 1935, Krueger was running at 550% of its pre-can production, and was finally unable to keep up with demand.

It was evident that the consumer liked the can's no-deposit feature as well as their being stackable, non-breakable, and fast cooling.

The consumers likes were certainly noted by the large breweries. During July of 1935, Pabst began distributing a striking blue and silver can carrying the "Export" label on a punch top can with opening instructions on the back of the label. The cans were first sold in Rockford, Illinois, and then spread southward.

Schlitz, trying to make up its mind about canning beer, suddenly quit wondering and went into action. In September of 1935, they became the first and the only major brewery to use Continental's new spout top can. Schlitz stayed with the cone top can until the early 1950's.

That first year of beer in cans ended with over 200 million cans being sold. Twenty three brewers had begun using cans, with the can company's score being: American Can- 12 brewers, Continental Can- 8 brewers, and National Can- 3 brewers.

The can makers of course were enthusiastic about the future of the can and were optimistically predicting over a billion and a half cans would be sold in 1936.