Ok.... I never thought about this before, but are Pony Keg stores unique to Cincinnati? I looked up the term to see if there were some history and was surprised to find very little information and the entire concept seems pretty localized to the Cincinnati area. Am I crazy?

i.e. Drive Thru? As a life long Cincinnatian I never figured out their appeal. I see cars go in them at all hours of the day. Even driving to work in the morning. People just got to have their 6-pack of diet Coke.

 

It's a strange concept. Never thought of it being unique to Cincy, but I haven't really noticed them on trips.

If a Pony Keg is a drive-thru store then we have a few in the Cleveland area.  Here they're usually named "<insert name here> Drive Thru>" or "<insert named here> Beverage"

No, a Pony Keg was pretty much just a corner store that sold beer but explicitly called a "Pony Keg".  Sometimes they had one of these drive-thru's, but usually it was just a small store that emphasized the sale of beer and tobacco products. 

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I think "Pony Keg" and "Del" are both Cincinnati-only inventions.  I definitely never heard the word "delicatessen" until I heard it uttered by some suspicious California-looking dude on Fun House (if anyone remembers that show) in 1988.  It's funny to think that I went quite awhile thinking that "del" was a word, without ever looking it up in a dictionary. 

No, a Pony Keg was pretty much just a corner store that sold beer but explicitly called a "Pony Keg".  Sometimes they had one of these drive-thru's, but usually it was just a small store that emphasized the sale of beer and tobacco products. 

 

Sounds like nearly every corner store in Cleveland, just that we don't call them "Pony Kegs".  They're usually called "Delis" here.

 

EDIT: Sorry, it seems the Street Views don't embed correctly, so just click the links.

 

Adam Deli

 

Tony's Delicatessen

 

Marvin's Deli

 

Although there is a "deli" called the "del" in the exurban town east of Cleveland where my in-laws live that mostly sells Mexican goods for the local nursery workers.

But the key distinction of a "Pony Keg" in Ohio is that they sell (or used to sell, depending on the individual business) 1/4 bbl kegs of beer. In most other cities in Ohio, you have to go to the beer distributor to get those.

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The pretty much all look like that, which is pretty awesome. Beats Ameristop! Good to know that these are mostly a Cincy invention.

The feature I most associate with Cincinnati pony kegs is that the customers remained outside.  The door was often like a garage door, and inside was a raised platform (3 or 4 feet high, 12 ft square) on which there was a cash register, racks of chips and petzels, and a door leading to the cooler.

 

And, knothole baseball depended on their sponsorship!

I've gotta imagine that the raised nature of the pony keg (example Mike's in Silverton at the intersection of Montgomery and Ohio) was so moving the keg was always a downward movement.

There is at least one Pony Keg in D8ton, nearly 100 years old - the Patterson Pony Keg.

 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kenworld24/2642879087/#

 

 

I remember when I lived in Baltimore they were called "package stores".  Also, I'm not sure but it seems like "beverage store" is a Cleveland thing.

They're known as package stores in Indiana, and I don't know any that have drive-through. That's probably prohibited under state law.

In Michigan, they are called "Party Store".

>was so moving the keg was always a downward movement.

 

I think a full keg is sized to the absolute max of the average man's ability to lift an object into a vehicle's trunk.  Even with two guys it's a bit awkward.  In college I had to lay down and take a nap (beer by my side) after moving three kegs from my car by myself into the house one afternoon.