Want to buy some Steuben Glass?

Longtime owner Corning Inc. has placed the maker of the only luxury lead crystal still handcrafted in the United States on the auction block.

The crystal business launched by Frederick Carder in 1903 has been unprofitable for a decade, lost $30 million over the last five years and will be unloaded most likely this year -- even if that means shutting it down, company officials said Thursday.

"This is a very difficult decision and has been under consideration for several years," said Corning's chief financial officer, James Flaws. "We do not have a deadline for a sale. We would hope to reach an agreement with a new owner by the end of this year.

"If we conclude that we cannot find a buyer," Flaws added, "we will consider other strategic options, which could include closing the business and the factory."

Carder's richly hued creations turned the English designer into a giant of the glass arts scene alongside Louis Comfort Tiffany and Rene Lalique. Corning bought out the business in 1918 and, as popular taste turned toward less ornate forms, formulated a colorless, highly refractive, heavy lead crystal that has distinguished Steuben since the Depression era.

Steuben Glass creates ornamental works of art that can cost into the tens of thousands of dollars. Its wine glasses are priced starting at $120 apiece.

Corning, based in a small western New York city of the same name, evolved in the 1990s into the world's biggest maker of optical fiber and cable and now dominates the global market for liquid crystal display glass used in computers and television monitors.

Steuben Glass has lately generated about $25 million in annual revenue and employs 150 people, Flaws said.

While crystal hasn't always contributed to profits, its value rested in the status it conferred on its owner and the potential of contributing new glassmaking technologies. But sales of pure-lead crystal have been steadily diminishing, and Steuben Glass posted a $5.7 million loss in 2007, Flaws said.

He said Corning might consider selling just the brand name and keep operating the factory, an option favored by the United Steelworkers of America, which represents 85 employees.

"It appears that it's just not a fashionable product anymore" and that "it's gotten to the end of the generation it appeals to," said the union local's president, Mike Walker.

Corning "made a lot of attempts at new products -- our people would have made whatever would have worked, be it color glass or whatever," Walker said. "Perhaps somebody else can come in and figure out how to get this beautiful product reintroduced into the marketplace and make it successful."

Corning shares fell 16 cents to $23.32 in afternoon trading Thursday.