Livingston’s EB Gray Jewelry credits research, customer service, and flexibility as key reasons behind the business’ success since it opened in 1914.
Fourth-Generation Owner Leon Harris said the business is steeped in family tradition as he worked with his grandfather for some thirty years. Harris said family traditions do not keep the business from adapting as the industry has changed a lot in his lifetime and people can get left behind very quickly.
“You have to be able to stay up with what the jewelry industry is doing,” Harris said. “And when gold gets high and you stop selling gold, or not totally stop selling it but when it slows down, you have to start looking for other things to sell in alternative metals and silver and stuff like that.”
Harris said his business is different from large jewelry stores because it works with customers and tries to educate them instead of pushing them to purchase something. Harris said he did not think about the 110-year milestone until it arrived because his main interest is growing the business so it can last for another hundred years, if not longer.
“I was born and raised here so I take a lot of pride in being in Livingston,” Harris said. “And with Livingston Academy and all the school sports we’re steeped with that tradition as well.”
Harris said the business is part of a Retail Jewelers Organization Buying Group that gives it the buying power of some 1,500 jewelry stores across the United States. Harris said that organization has seminars and other events he can go to in order to keep up with what is happening in his industry.
“There is a gap from when the big jewelry stores, your Kay’s and JCPenney and stuff like that, that want to sell jewelry online and we’ve always been a brick-and-mortar store,” Harris said. “And I think that’s just, there’s just a difference.”
Harris said his great-grandfather started the business in 1914. Harris said he and his sister are the fourth generation to run the business and they each have a daughter working in the shop as well.
“You know a lot of people in your community and that’s who your customers are,” Harris said. “So I think it’s real special for us to be in a small type town so we can know our customers.”
The business was recently recognized for its lasting presence in Livingston by the local Chamber of Commerce.
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