Agency: Baldwin&, Raleigh, N.C.
Client: Ponysaurus Brewing Co., Durham, N.C.
CDs: David Baldwin, Bob Ranew
Designer/Illust: Kellyn McGarity
CW: Chad Temples
Fabricator: Jerry Bodrie (Ponysaurus leave-behinds)
Prod.: Mattias Davidsson
Engraving artist: Steven Noble, Petaluma, Calif.
Lithographer: Typecase Industries, Washington, D.C. (coaster business cards)
Country: United States

Ponysaurus rears its scaly head

In its first work for new microwbrew client, Ponysaurus Brewing Co., Durham, N.C., advertising agency Baldwin&, Raleigh, has developed a brand I.D. to support the brewer’s positioning attributes: traditional beer craftsmanship and flavors, along with an unceremonious and light-hearted attitude. The name Ponysaurus is meant to suggest a fusion of unlike parts, a chimera. I.D. elements include a logo, bottle design, business cards, leave-behinds, and a growler case.

The logo, meticulously etched in the style of a 19th Century zoological illustration, features the company namesake, one of the sillier-looking creatures never to have walked the earth, with equine hindquarters and a dinosaur head and stunted little arms.

The bomber-size (1 pint, 6 ounce) bottles are paper-wrapped and 2c printed, uniformly black and white across the entire line, with just a small gold callout for the individual beers’ names. The paper wrap helps protect the beers from spoilage due to light. A Ponysaurus-liveried bottle tape, recalling the revenue tape seen on spirits bottles, spans the top.

Collateral materials are intended to impart whimsy. Letterpress-printed Ponysaurus business cards double as bar coasters. A small menagerie of salesman’s give-aways and leave-behinds are hand-fashioned from assorted toy plastic dinosaurs and horses, sawn, sutured, and spray-painted gold. Logo’d wooden growler cases, more often seen holding two 4-pint growlers, are repurposed to hold four Ponysaurus bombers.

Baldwin& credits go to creative directors David Baldwin and Bob Ranew, designer/illustrator Kellyn McGarity, copywriter Chad Temples, leave-behind fabricator Jerry Bodrie, and producer Mattias Davidsson. Engraving artist Steven Noble, of Petaluma, Calif., reworked McGarity’s original illustration for fine, small-sized reproduction, and lithographer Typecase Industries, of Washington, D.C. printed the debossed coaster business cards.

Ponysaurus Brewing Co. was established in 2013 and delivered its first brews, to bars, late last year. This January marks its first non-keg, retail availability, initially in North Carolina. Its six beers, including Fig Saison Ale (fruitier, higher carbonation), Bière de Garde Ale (farmhouse ale), Scottish Ale (high gravity), Réserve Ale (Belgian, 9.3% ABV), Imperial Stout (10.3% ABV) and Videri Chocolate Stout (dark chocolate), will sell for between $7.50 and $10.50 per 22 oz. bottle.

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