If you’ve always wanted to own a gently used theater in downtown Greensboro, this is your chance.

The Triad Stage building at 232 S. Elm St. is going up for auction on Monday, Dec. 11 through Wednesday, Dec. 13.  The bidding for the 34,774-square-foot building built in 1936 starts at $300,000.

The description in the auction notice states, “Iconic downtown Greensboro former performing arts theater with immense value-add potential as an entertainment or retail operation.” The building includes a 300 seat theater and an 80 seat cabaret space.

Triad Stage announced in June that, after 20 years and more than 140 mainstage productions, it was permanently closing its doors. Most people recovered from COVID, but Triad Stage did not. It can be considered another casualty of the long COVID-19 restrictions. The press release announcing its closure states, “Triad Stage is the latest in a series of long-running regional theaters unable to sustain post-pandemic operations.”

It notes that Triad Stage was closed due to the pandemic of two-and-a-half years and, despite making significant changes, it could not recover from the accumulated financial deficit.

Triad Stage was opened in 2002 by two Yale graduates, Preston Lane and Richard Whittington, as a non-profit regional theater.  The building now up for auction is the old Montgomery Ward building, which had been vacant for almost 40 years when it was purchased and renovated into a performing arts theater.

Triad Stage completed a second round of renovations to the building in 2008, to turn a storage area into the 80-seat cabaret space, add a rehearsal hall and offices.

Up until 2020, the theater continued to expand – purchasing a new production facility and including performances in Winston-Salem.

However, in April 2020, the theater had to stop operations due to COVID and not reopening until October 2022.  It paused its operation again in April 2023 before announcing the permanent closure in June.

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