The Family Dog was the name used by the west coast concert promoters managed by Chet Helms. Concerts were initially staged at The Fillmore Auditorium, alternating weekends with Bill Graham. In April 1966, Helms moved the Family Dog to a new venue, the Avalon Ballroom, an old dancehall situated at the corner of Sutter and Van Ness. The Family Dog promoted acts such as Big Brother and the Holding Company, Moby Grape, Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, and Bo Diddley.

Helms was the founder and manager of Big Brother and the Holding Company and recruited Janis Joplin as its lead singer. This poster, by Mouse Studios, was one of the first to headline the band. The ‘Zig-Zag’ man was appropriated from the logo of the brand of cigarette papers, and was among the first rock posters to be replicated or ‘bootlegged’. At the bottom of the poster is the passage ‘What you don’t know about copying and duplication won’t hurt you’, but clearly plagiarism did hurt Helms. The pirating of his poster so irritated Helms that he produced a "Genuine Counterfeit" stamp to be added (by club staff) to as many of the imitation posters as could be found, in an attempt to prevent others from further imitation of an already borrowed image.