Gregory Jewelers set to change hands after 75 years in Morganton

At 110 N. Sterling St. in downtown Morganton, the next owner of Gregory Jewelers will inherit more than a storefront. The business is preparing to change hands after a run that stretches back to 1948, with generations of local customers having trusted the same address for engagement rings, repairs, appraisals and the pieces that mark family milestones.

The shop’s history reaches even farther back than the Gregory name. Sam Shavitz opened the Sterling Street location in 1939, and when sales lagged in Morganton in 1948, he asked Lavone Gregory, then working in his Statesville store, to take over the Morganton operation. Lavone and his wife, Callie, agreed on the condition that she could join him and that he would have a chance to buy into the business. The Gregory family assumed management and part ownership in September 1948, then bought the store outright in 1961.

That kind of continuity is rare in a city the size of Morganton, which had a population of 17,474 in the 2020 Census. Gregory Jewelers has functioned as a downtown fixture, not just a retail counter, for nearly a century on the same stretch of Sterling Street. The store’s long presence matters because jewelry repairs, bridal purchases and anniversary gifts are rarely anonymous transactions; they arrive carrying names, dates and memory.

Steve Gregory, Lavone’s son, grew up around that history. He began working in the store young, returned to the family business in 1972 and worked there for 45 years before stepping back on June 30, 2017. His career reflected the same long arc that defined the store itself. Steven Lavone Gregory later became president in 1983 and was active in the American Gem Society, the North Carolina Guild of the American Gem Society and the North Carolina Jewelers Association, extending the store’s influence beyond Burke County and into the state’s jewelry trade.

Today, Gregory Jewelers describes itself as a full-service jeweler specializing in fine diamond and gemstone jewelry, bridal jewelry, engagement rings, wedding bands, custom design, jewelry repairs, jewelry appraisals and engraving. The business celebrated its 75th anniversary with a week-long event from Sept. 29 to Oct. 7, 2023, complete with a storewide sale, daily giveaways and a live radio broadcast, a reminder that the store’s value has always been measured in more than inventory. In a town where personal milestones are often tied to one familiar counter, the handoff will test whether Gregory Jewelers can keep doing the harder work of continuity, preserving trust as carefully as the stones in its cases.