Elder Brau Lager Beer Test Can

Maier's Elder Brau Test Can

This straight-steel tab top container represents a 12-ounce test can for Elder Brau Lager Beer, developed for Maier Brewing Company in Los Angeles, California. Created as an experimental sample to evaluate graphics and layout before full packaging deployment, the face features a stylized heraldic shield displaying the initials "EB" beneath a coronet crest, flanked by detailed hop bines above a bold circular centerpiece.

Elder Brau was marketed as a traditional, German-style lager distributed throughout western regional territories through distributors such as Wellington Beverage. Over its lifespan, the brand appeared under various West Coast brewing operations—including Grace Brothers and Maier—as part of the mid-century contract and private-label market. By pairing Germanic blackletter typography with heraldic motifs, the brand was positioned to project heritage and quality to price-conscious beer drinkers before disappearing from shelves in the late 1960s.

The producer, Maier Brewing Company, had roots dating back to the late nineteenth century. In 1882, Bavarian immigrant Joseph Maier joined partner George Zobelein in purchasing Los Angeles's historic Philadelphia Brewery. The plant survived the lean years of Prohibition by marketing near beer and tonics, eventually reorganizing upon Repeal. In 1950, financier Paul Kalmanovitz acquired the brewery, revitalizing output with the flagship Brew 102 while aggressively expanding Maier's contract-brewing and private-label packaging divisions. Maier remained a major industrial fixture in downtown Los Angeles until the facility was sold and shuttered in the 1970s.

Test cans produced for regional breweries hold a distinct appeal for breweriana collectors. Because experimental runs and pre-production proofs were generated in very limited quantities for internal review, distributor pitches, or canning-line setup, they provide a fascinating look at mid-century package design and brewery marketing strategies that were never mass-distributed to the general public.