KITCHENER — The iconic Oktoberfest castle at the corner of Benton Street and Charles Street East in downtown Kitchener is for sale.

It has been home of the Bavarian festival since 1989, but on Thursday the three-storey office building at 17 Benton St. was posted for sale, valued at a little more than $1.8 million.

A declining number of visitors interested in purchasing memorabilia or tickets from the main floor retail store was one of the driving factors behind the sale, according to Kitchener-Waterloo Oktoberfest executive director Alfred Lowrick.

"We're busy maybe four weeks per year, and is that a good use of a resource? Absolutely not," said Lowrick in an interview Friday afternoon. "It's something that has always bothered me; we have this asset and we're not maximizing it."

Just steps from several light rail transit stops near the heart of downtown Kitchener, the building boasts more than 11,000 square feet of space including a main floor retail store, offices on the second and third floor, basement storage and three parking spots.

It was originally built as a mill during the 1930s and was a ski shop before Oktoberfest purchased the building more than three decades ago, Lowrick said.

They're considering all their options when it comes to finding a new home, including renting the space back from the purchaser, buying a new property or renting space elsewhere in the community.

Keeping the building and renting out the main floor retail space was also a possibility, but the COVID-19 pandemic made the plan unrealistic as all non-essential businesses have closed, Lowrick said.

The potential sale comes just weeks after the festival received a final review it had commissioned last year to look into the long-term viability of the event, which first launched in the late 1960s.

Faced with financial losses, declining sponsorships and a sense that the festival was stuck in the past, the not-for-profit organization that runs the event now recognizes it is facing a crisis and may only have a few years to turn it around.

Oktoberfest still draws tens of thousands of people into this region every fall and pulls as much as $20 million into the local economy, but the parent organization lost $216,000 last year, $150,000 in 2018, and $112,000 in 2017.

The festival needs to modernize and broaden its appeal to a younger demographic, and the sale of the property could help fund that transformation, Lowrick said.

Organizers are also keeping a nervous eye on how COVID-19, which has sickened more than 30,000 Canadians and killed more than 1,300, continues to spread. Lowrick said they're waiting until July to determine if or how the event will proceed.

"We're anxious to plan the festival and we have some alternative plans in place, but in early July we'll make a decision about what the festival will look like in 2020."

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jjackson@therecord.com

Twitter: @JamesDEJ