Canned beer wasn’t publicly or commercially available until 24th January 1935 when cans of Krueger's Finest Beer and Krueger's Cream Ale first went on sale in Richmond, Virginia, USA. It was a surprisingly late invention for such an ancient and ubiquitous drink, but its early development had been severely hampered by Prohibition, a nationwide ban on alcoholic drinks in the United States from 1920.
So why did it take the ale-loving world so long to put beer in cans? The problem wasn’t the can itself – the concept of preserving food in tin cans had been around since 1810 – but the beer’s carbonation, which effectively made it a yeasty hand grenade. The pressure that built up inside a sealed can was said to be more than twice that of a car tyre, causing early prototypes to burst dramatically and dangerously when stored or transported. The other problem, of course, was flavour. The beer was prone to chemically reacting with the metal it was stored in and spoiling the brew.
That’s why up until 1920, beer had only been available in cask, keg or bottle. But some of the bigger breweries in the USA, like Anheuser-Busch and Pabst, were starting to look at more convenient and less expensive alternatives. They even got to the stage of asking American Can Company, an established innovator in can technology in the early 19th century who had supplied the American Expeditionary Force with canned food during World War I, to start experimenting. But then Prohibition struck, and everyone had bigger things to worry about.
It's hard to underestimate the impact Prohibition had on the beer industry. Pre-1920, there were about 1,300 brewers in the USA. 13 years later, after the repeal, there were about 100. The problem was, no one had thought the ban would last as long as it did – so owners just kept hanging on for better times that never came. The businesses that survived had glimpsed the future, quickly diversifying their portfolio to make other products, from soft drinks and malt syrups to ice cream and chewing gum.
But the American Can Company never truly gave up the idea of canned beer. By tinkering in the background, they had created what they thought was a workable solution – a can strong enough to withstand the pressure and a lining inside called ‘Keglined’, a combination of enamel and brewer’s pitch (a natural blend of pine and other resins) that stopped the interaction between metal and beer. This material was later refined and replaced by Vinylite, a plastic coating (interestingly, Vinylite was also used to make music records – which is why we call them vinyl).
The problem of can weakness was solved by Charles Stollberg, who came up with the idea of soldering each layer of tin in the fold of the lateral seam, a technique he patented on 19th April 1927 (patent No. 1,625,229).
But even with such innovation, the big national breweries were still sceptical about the idea, so American Can looked around for a smaller regional brewery willing to test their technology.
Enter the Gottfried Krueger Brewing Company based in Newark, New Jersey. Like most companies at the time, the family business was on its knees. They had survived Prohibition by making 0.5% ABV drinks (called ‘near beer’) and soft drinks but it was at just a third of its capacity and wasn’t prospering. To cap it off, its inspirational founder Gottfried Krueger had died in 1926 and its workers went on strike as soon as repeal came.
But all was not lost. Because they’d been making 0.5% beer, Krueger’s was ready to go when 3.2% beer was legalised on 7th April 1933 (full strength beer wouldn’t become legal until December the same year when the 21st Amendment was ratified). This was such a zeitgeist moment in beer history that a thirsty New Jersey crowd gathered outside the brewery in the dead of night, waiting for the clock to strike midnight and beer could be sold legally. It’s said there were queues around the block for two days!
This caught the attention of American Can Company, who approached Krueger with an offer that was hard to refuse. They promised to install the new canning equipment for free – the brewery would only pay for it if the experiment was a success. Krueger leapt at the chance and signed an agreement in mid 1933, kick-starting a series of events that would change beer forever.
American Can worked quickly. By 15th October, they’d installed a temporary canning line and filled 2,000 cans of Krueger’s 3.2% ABV beer to test in the real world. These trial cans had a different name and label, called Krueger’s Special Beer. With finger’s crossed, the brewery sent four cans to 500 loyal customers for free, along with a questionnaire that would score their experience. To minimise their risk, they only sent them to drinkers in Richmond, Virginia, which was at the very edge of their distribution network and far enough away that it wouldn’t cause any reputational damage should the cans prove unpopular.
The results were off the charts – better than anyone could ever have expected. 91% of respondents gave the new canned beer a positive review and 85% said it tasted more like draft than bottled beer.
Buoyed by the success, Krueger gave the beer can experiment the green light and the rest is history. When Prohibition was officially repealed on 5th December 1933, they were able to fill full strength beers too – but it wasn’t until 24th January 1935 (414 days afterwards) that the first beers were on shelves and available to buy. But by March, the brewery’s sales were up by 550%. By the summer, Krueger was said to be buying 180,000 cans a day from the American Can Company.
With such recognisable success, other businesses followed suit. By the end of 1935, 37 breweries had adopted the can. It made perfect sense. For the brewer, it proved better than glass – cans were lightweight, cheaper and easier to stack and ship. For the customer, it was hassle-free – you could throw them away after use, rather than return your beer bottle to get your deposit back.
But these early cans weren’t exactly the ultra-lightweight aluminium cans of today. Originally, they were made of heavy-gauge steel and weighed around four ounces, almost as much as a billiard ball. And that’s WITHOUT the beer inside. So, the American Can Company devised an opener that would punch a hole in the lid so it could be easily poured into a glass. Invented by Dewitt Sampson and John Hothersall, it was known as the ‘church key’, a heavy-duty bit of metal with a pointed end to pierce the can. They were often given away for free with the cans – with instructions on how to use it printed on the label.
Of course, everybody wanted in on the new can revolution but it was sometimes prohibitively expensive to install the new packaging lines and equipment, especially for smaller breweries. The problem was ingeniously solved by Continental Can Company in September 1935 when they brought out a metal can that was shaped like a bottle – known as a ‘cone top’ – that could run through the original bottling lines and be sealed with a cap without having to upgrade any machinery.
They looked great, like some sort of beer rocket, a hybrid of can and bottle but had pretty much died out by World War II, when steel was in short supply.
In the UK, breweries were watching the US innovations with interest. The first to adopt the process was a little-known Welsh business called Felinfoel Brewery, based in Felinfoel village (population 2,000) near Llanelli, Carmarthenshire, Wales. The family business also owned tin mines, so the idea of canning worked doubly in their favour.
The weekly ‘Llanelli and County Guardian’ recorded the historic moment on 3rd December 1935, under the triple heading: ‘Canned Beer Arrives’, ‘Epoch-Making Process at Felinfoel Brewery’, ‘New Hope for Tinplate Industry’.
The cans were ‘cone tops’ and came in two sizes, 10oz for the domestic market (the equivalent of half-pint bottles) and 12oz for export – a template followed by other early innovators. By October 1937, around 23 breweries in the UK were producing over 40 different brands of canned beer! Of course, from 1939, the outbreak of World War II stopped the domestic market growth dead – the only beer cans that breweries were allowed to produce were for troops abroad.
After the war, beer lovers were still having to heft their ‘church key’ openers around whenever they wanted a canned beer, which wasn’t that practical outside of the home environment. But it wasn’t until 1962 that there was an alternative.
Pittsburg Brewing Company were the first to use a pull tab (or a ring pull if you’re in the UK) on a beer can – an innovative feature they introduced to their flagship Iron City Beer. It had been developed by a wonderfully named engineer and inventor called Ermal Cleon Fraze, who lived in Dayton, Ohio, USA. He’d realised that the secret lay in a central rivet – he put a small, levered fastener in the middle of the can’s top, so when you pulled down on one end it broke the other, breaking the pre-cut seal and allowing the beer to flow (U.S. Patent No. 3,349,949). Problem was, of course, the edges of the pull tabs were seriously sharp – and became a litter problem when discarded – so took time to become loved, especially by bartenders!
Despite the problems, the pull tab was a huge success. Pittsburg Brewing ordered 100,000 cans at the end of 1962 and their sales shot up by 400% in six months. It caught on to such an extent that by 1965, 75% of all breweries were using a ring pull can, making the church key basically obsolete.
Further subtler innovations continued over the next decade, culminating with Daniel F. Cudzik, an engineer with Reynolds Metal Company in the USA, who patented the ‘Stay-Tab’ in 1975, the push-in, fold-back opener we use today. It was first used on beers from the Falls City Brewing Company in Louisville, Kentucky.
Since then, the structure of beer cans has remained relatively consistent. Sure, there are a ton of different sizes, but they’ve steadily got thinner, lighter and more sustainable over the years. We take it for granted that our beer is delivered in cans today – they’ve certainly become the most popular packaging globally (aluminium cans made up 62% of beer volume produced and sold in the United States in 2018). So next time you open that pull tab, think on the 100 or so years of innovation that has gone into ensuring your enjoyment of your favourite ale. Cheers!
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