Photo by Deb Gau Boxcar Liquors manager Tam Schons, at left, and Tracy Mayor Pam Cooreman, at right, joined Brau Brothers brewery workers in packing a few boxes of a limited-label beer celebrating Tracy’s Boxcar Days festival. The “Boxcar Brew” label will be available this week at Boxcar Liquors, Tracy’s municipal liquor store.

MARSHALL — A long line of Brau Brothers beer bottles were coming out of the labeling machine on Wednesday morning, ready to be boxed and delivered. There was something special about this shipment of beer, however: the bottles had limited-edition labels celebrating Tracy’s Boxcar Days festival.

“We wanted to do something new, something different and especially for Tracy,” said Tam Schons, manager of Boxcar Liquors in Tracy.

Schons and Tracy Mayor Pam Cooreman were at the Brau Brothers brewery in Marshall last week to see the new “Boxcar Brew” come off the bottling line. Schons and Cooreman even joined Brau employees in helping to pack a few boxes of beer bottles.

A limited quantity of Boxcar Brew will be available this week at Boxcar Liquors, Tracy’s municipal liquor store. The run of special labels was only on about 200 cases of beer, a Brau Brothers spokesperson said.

Boxcar Liquors, the city of Tracy and Above the Fold Publishing worked together with Brau Brothers to create the special labels ahead of Boxcar Days this weekend. It’s the first time that Brau Brothers has bottled a private-label beer, Schons said.

The Boxcar Brew label project came together in a relatively short time frame. Schons said planning for a special craft beer label began around February or March. The special label would be a way to showcase the city of Tracy and Boxcar Days, she said.

“I took the idea to Brau Brothers, because we wanted to do it locally,” Schons said. The idea of keeping things in the area community also extended to designing the Boxcar Brew label. April DeSchepper, who was then at Above the Fold Publishing in Tracy, created the design.

The Boxcar Brew label includes the image of a boxcar in honor of Boxcar Days and Tracy’s history as a railroad town. The label also features a wood pattern, as a nod to the reclaimed wood used in the liquor store’s décor.

Designing a beer bottle label wasn’t a simple process, said Per Peterson of Above the Fold Publishing. In addition to working with the city of Tracy and Brau Brothers, they had to work with the government to make sure the labels met requirements.

“We’re proud of what we were able to do for the city,” Peterson said.

“It’s exciting to watch it all happen,” Schons said of the Boxcar Brew labeling. Much like Boxcar Days itself, the project took a lot of teamwork to come to fruition.

Tracy’s 94th annual Boxcar Days festival kicks off on Friday evening with the Tracy Area Chamber’s burger feed. Attractions like carnival rides, and community events like a street dance, kids’ activities and the Miss Tracy scholarship program, will continue through Labor Day weekend. The Boxcar Days grand parade is at 1 p.m. Monday.