Milwaukee Brand Premium Beer 12 Oz Tab Top Can

Milwaukee Brand Premium Beer Can

This 12-ounce straight steel tab top can dates to the 1970s pull tab era and is distinguished by its inclusion of dual measurement text. Along the bottom rim, the volume is printed as "CONTENTS 12 FL OZS (354 ml)," capturing the era when American beverage packaging increasingly incorporated metric units alongside traditional fluid ounces. The can also bears the postal zip code 08037 within the mandatory brewery declaration, along with upper banner text highlighting the use of pure artesian well water, select hops, and fine brewing ingredients.

Milwaukee Brand Premium Beer was marketed as a budget-friendly domestic lager that leveraged the historic prestige of Milwaukee's brewing reputation, despite being produced in southern New Jersey. The graphic identity reinforced this premium framing through a central crest showcasing a crowned letter "M" surrounded by a grain wreath, paired with bold typography to stand out on retail shelves as a classic, value-priced American lager.

Waukee Brewing Company was one of many trade names and "doing business as" (DBA) imprints operated by the Eastern Brewing Corporation of Hammonton, New Jersey. Eastern Brewing traces its roots back to 1933 following the repeal of Prohibition, originally operating as the Eastern Beverage Corporation. As national brewing conglomerates expanded and squeezed mid-sized regional producers, Eastern survived by leaning heavily into contract brewing, private supermarket labels, and diverse subsidiary nameplates. By packaging beer under dozens of localized and traditional-sounding trade names like Waukee, the Hammonton plant remained active for decades before ultimately shutting its doors in the early 1990s.

Within breweriana collecting, cans produced under Eastern Brewing's various phantom brewery names hold significant interest as artifacts of the contract brewing boom of the 1960s and 1970s. The dual-labeled metric declaration makes this straight steel can a telling physical record of standard labeling transitions during the late twentieth century.