Olympia Little Oly Beer 7 Oz Tab Top Can

Olympia Little Oly 7-Ounce Can

This straight-steel seven-ounce container represents a classic "pony" can format from the Olympia Brewing Company of Tumwater, Washington. Finished in gloss enamel over steel, this example features a traditional tab top opening, although versions fitted with a coin-slot bank lid are also well-documented by collectors. The front panel highlights the brand's iconic "Good Luck" horseshoe framing Tumwater Falls and the river bridge, flanked by heads of barley and hops. It also carries the brewery's celebrated slogan, "It's the Water," alongside text citing the solvent purity of their local artesian wells.

Introduced in 1962, the "Little Oly" brand variation was developed as an easy-to-carry, quick-drinking portion that would not grow warm before being finished. Packaged in eight-can cartons, marketing positioned the miniature size toward outdoor recreationalists such as boaters and campers, as well as social hosts looking for a convenient way to serve guests without splitting standard twelve-ounce containers. The smaller can offered the same flagship American lager as the standard lineup. As regional brewers faced changing packaging trends and increasing pressure from national conglomerates over subsequent decades, the format was ultimately retired.

The Olympia Brewing Company originated in 1896, when German immigrant Leopold Schmidt founded the Capital Brewing Company in Tumwater, drawn by the site's prolific natural artesian springs. Renamed Olympia Brewing Company in 1902, the business survived state and national Prohibition by producing soft drinks, juices, and candy under a separate operating identity. Upon the repeal of Prohibition in 1933, Schmidt's sons reopened the brewing plant and grew Olympia into one of the Pacific Northwest's most prominent regional brewing powerhouses. The company expanded through the mid-to-late twentieth century, but mounting competition eventually led to its purchase by Pabst, and brewing operations in Tumwater ceased permanently in 2003.

For collectors, "Little Oly" cans hold sustained appeal within the popular niche of seven-ounce small-format cans and Pacific Northwest breweriana. The overlap between standard production beverage cans and promotional souvenir coin bank lids adds a distinct element of crossover interest between advertising memorabilia and can collecting.