The Buffs Club in Penryn could be sold to developers after being put up for tender due to declining footfall and increased costs.

The Penryn Lodge of the Royal Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes - known as the Buffs - has put the club building on Tresooth Lane up for sale, with an asking price of at least £300,000.

The listing describes the site as a "development opportunity" close to the town centre and "moments from the university," and says that it is "suitable, in our opinion, for a variety of uses, subject to consents."

Dave Crooks, the club manager, said part of the reason for the closure was because it could no longer hold functions such as weddings or parties, due to having a premises certificate rather than a licence which would allow such events.

He said: "We had to change the licence. The rates were getting too high, and people weren't using the club as much.

"We just couldn't keep going, trying to pay the bills every month.

"There are a lot of other places struggling... that's just the way it is.

"We tried for the last two years to keep it going, and we were struggling, but in the end we just had to face facts and put it up for sale."

Once the club is sold, Mr Crooks said, he believes the lodge will be looking to buy a smaller premises, but he said they have "not indicated exactly what they are going to do."

The three storey building, built following the Second World War on the site of an earlier club, includes a main hall with a bar and dance floor, cellar, and an upstairs meeting room with another bar and dance floor.

The lodge had considered plans to convert the top floor into accommodation in order to supplement the running of the club, but those plans were dropped following pre-application consultations with Penryn Town Council and Cornwall Council.

The listing states: "No approach has, at this stage, been made to the local planning authority regarding any potential change of use and therefore interested prospective purchasers are encouraged to make their own enquiries in this regard."

The club was accepting offers of £300,000 or over by a process of informal tender, up until Friday, August 5, and will decide in due course whether any offer is to be accepted.