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Title
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Newspaper Clipping: J. W. Gregory, July 5, 2000
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Accession Number
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2026.38.1.20
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Accession Date
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16 June 2026
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Accession Creator
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Meadow Knapp
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Description
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Copy of Greenville News newspaper clipping of an interview with J. W. Gregory
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Contributor
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Nan Lundeen
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Date
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July 5, 2000
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Format
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White copy paper
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Storage Location
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Box 33, Folder #2
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Text
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Gregory set example of kindness for others to follow
Continued from Page 1
"He always has been a mentor of mine," Duncan said. "Mr. Gregory has always been a good man, very good to people, always kind and someone who everybody just ad-mires. I'm thankful to have him as a friend and as a boss man." The Greer native has been working for Gregory 23 years.
"He always liked the way I dressed," Duncan said. "I was al-ways the clean-cut, real neat guy. He always liked that about me."
Gregory set Duncan to work selling caps, jewelry and shades on the streets and in the neighbor-hoods.
"He brought back every penny," Gregory remembers. "I liked that."
Gregory also gave a job to Willie Ballenger who knew Gregory when he was in high school. For five years, Ballenger worked at the Greer boutique.
"He taught me a lot of things, and he was more like a father fig-ure to me and a friend," said Bal-lenger, whose own father was de-ceased. Gregory taught Ballenger "to be fair to people, and to give, and not belittle people." Ballenger lives in Wellford and has worked for Mitsubishi Polyester Film LLC for 16 years.
Gregory, himself, set an exam-ple.
"He was fair," Ballenger said. He watched Gregory extend credit to people who had none so that they could establish a credit record, he said. But most meaningful of all to Ballenger - "He trusted me."
Some of the young men Gregory mentored were headed down a dangerous path. Now and then, Gregory had a tough sell to steer the guy back.
"I was real hard on them," Gre-gory said. "I made them do the right thing."
The walls of his boutique in Greer hold pictures and articles about African Americans Gregory admires, among them, his late fa-ther, Staff Sgt. John W. Gregory, who was a chef in the U.S. Air Force.
There also is a portrait of a man named Sam who used to walk around town pulling weeds for a few dollars. When he would lie in the street to pull weeds in front of the store, Gregory would go out and direct traffic around him. Ev-ery Saturday, he came in the store to buy socks. Gregory explained that's where Sam kept the money people paid him, in socks.
Gregory drew upon his experi-ence as a coach and a teacher to help young men and to succeed in business. While teaching seventh grade at Gower Street School in Greenville, he was trained to teach a motivational course. He not only learned how to help his students set and meet goals, he too the lessons home to his heart and set his will and his determination on the clothing business.
"I never felt defeated and never felt doomed. I just knew I could make it," Gregory said.
He and his wife, Martha, whom he met while they were students at Lincoln High in Taylors, were teachers in the 1960s. He worked three jobs in the summertime and put that money into buying cloth-
PROFILE
Name: J.W. Gregory
Residence: Lyman; born and reared in Greer
Family: Wife, Martha; daughter, Demetra who has three sons; son, James Jr.
Education: Bachelor's degree in elementary education from Benedict College, Columbia
Career: Owner, Gregory's Boutique Inc.; former coach and teacher
Service: Formerly active, Greater Greer Chamber of Commerce; Greer Development Committee; member, Maple Creek Baptist Church
Hobbies: Golf, gardening
ing. All of it fit in the trunk of his car. Gregory's Boutique opened in a building on East Poinsett Street the budding businessman rented for $74 a month. He now owns that building and two next to it which house Cynthia's Boutique, a package store and a Mexican goods store.
"I went in and put a piece on the wall here, and a piece on the wall here, and a piece here - tried to make it look like I had something. And, we commenced to grow," he said. "We were not wasteful. Every penny was put back into the store. We did that for three years." His mother, Grace Gregory, ran the store until he could get there after school.
He often tells her, "without mom, no Gregory's Boutique."
After four years, Gregory was working full time at the store, and they moved up East Poinsett to a larger building closer to Main Street. The property at 114 W. Poinsett St., where he is presently located, housed a Chevrolet deal-ership, and it came up for sale.
The downpayment "took every dime" Gregory could scrounge. For 10 years, a dance group rented the upstairs, and Gregory rented out the building behind his store.
"The property paid for itself," he said.
Over the years, Gregory has stuck to his goal to satisfy every one of his customers.
"He cannot be mean or hateful enough for us to be rude to him," Gregory said of his customers. Many of them, however, are "church folk. They're so nice, and I have learned so much from them." He's also able and willing to tell people whether something looks good.
"He's very creative," his wife, Martha Gregory, said.
By the late 1970s, his business was established, and he became in-volved with a downtown mer-chants' association in Greer. They worked together to promote down-town retail stores. During this time, Gregory opened satellite stores in Laurens and Greenville.
A few years ago, after a myriad of tests for severe headaches, his doctor prescribed golf. Now, while Gregory admires the work the Greater Greer Chamber of Com-merce and other civic groups are doing, he's taking a rest from downtown rejuvenation projects.
But he's not taking a rest from outfitting people in the right hat, or pair of shoes, the handsome suit or coat, jewelry with a snappy look or the perfect tie. Retirement? Slowing down doesn't seem to be a lesson this student of life chooses to learn.
"Not in the picture," he says.