New owners of Iron City Brewing would have an opportunity to give an old beer a fresh look, brewing industry watchers say.

“There’s no reason it can’t succeed. There’s a million old beers out there,” said Peter V.K. Reid, publisher of Modern Brewery Age Magazine of Weston, Conn. “They might want to tweak the formulation to differentiate it and repackage it. At some point, it seems like they lost their way and consumers were seduced by other brands.”

The Tribune-Review reported this week that Uni-World Capital L.P., a New York City private equity firm, is poised to announce plans to buy Iron City Brewing Co. nearly two years after the 150-year-old brand moved production from its original plant in Lawrenceville to a contract brewery in Latrobe.

Brian Peiritsch, a spokesman for Uni-World, declined to comment on Tuesday but said more information will be coming soon. Iron City President Tim Hickman didn’t return calls. On Monday, Hickman said a nondisclosure agreement prohibited him from talking about the deal.

Reid said even though Iron City’s production has dropped, its move to a third-party brewery likely reduced costs, making it more attractive to investors. Iron City stopped sharing production figures with his publication some time ago, he said.

He said the brand could rebuild loyalty by making small changes such as adding a darker malt to give it a more amber color, hiring an acclaimed brewmaster and capitalizing on Iron City’s historic reputation as a “beefier” light American lager.

He said the new owners might be wise to try to tap into the craft beer market as well, where sales are rising at a time when major brewers are experiencing declining or stagnant sales. On Monday, Anheuser-Busch announced it would pay $38.8 million to buy Goose Island, a Chicago microbrewery.

Simply repackaging Iron City likely won’t go far enough to entice some beer drinkers, no matter where it’s made, said Jeff Bearer, 34, of Cranberry, who co-produces Craft Beer Radio, a weekly Internet podcast.

“They’re trying to market a brand, not brew good beer,” Bearer, a computer systems administrator and self-described “beer geek,” said of Iron City. “They’re already dead to me. There’s not much they could do other than reinvent themselves as a craft brewery.”

When Iron City moved operations, it left Pittsburgh without any mid-size to large regional brewers. But several microbreweries operate in the city limits, including East End Brewing Co. and in restaurants such as Penn Brewery in the North Side, Church Brew Works in Bloomfield and Hofbrauhaus in the South Side.

Reid, of Modern Brewery Age Magazine, said brands that leave their home breweries can thrive, although they might lose some hometown loyalists.

“Sam Adams started in Pittsburgh,” he said. “They used to take flak back in Boston for not being brewed in Boston. It could be the reverse if you had Iron City brewed in upstate New York. It’s not the death knell for a home brand to be brewed elsewhere.”

Demand for Iron City at some Pittsburgh distributors has dipped in the past year, but it still sells, according to distributors contacted by the Tribune-Review. The price of a case of Iron City ranges from $18 to $21 at area beer distributors.

“It’s probably below Coors Light and Bud, but it still has its follow among the 40-and-up crowd,” said John Herak, 26, a clerk at Abbott’s Beer in the North Side.

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