In March of 1990, local owners, Richard and Sarah Bennett broke ground for a family owned and operated Nursing facility known as The GrayBrier Nursing & Rehabilitation Center. The Bennett's extensive background in Nursing Home Administration, consisting of four decades of combined experience, allows the GrayBrier to run efficiently while offering excellent care. Richard and Sarah are still owners and operators to this day and are on-site daily to oversee operations and maintain their high operating standards of the GrayBrier and the sister facility, The Shannon Gray Rehabilitation & Recovery Center located in Jamestown, NC.

Thousands of visitors, residents, and families have passed through our doors since our Grand Opening in November of 1990. The GrayBrier prides itself on having a stable Management team and ownership group as these have remained the same since our conception and will continue into the foreseeable future.

In February 2011, Justin Percival joined the GrayBrier team as an Administrator-in-Training. Justin stepped up as the GrayBrier Administrator in April of 2013.

The GrayBrier now boasts 3 full-time Licensed Nursing Home Administrators. The GrayBrier has been noted, from an operations standpoint, as being in the top one percent of all skilled nursing facilities in North Carolina , according to a top accounting firm in North Carolina.

In 1989 during the construction of the GrayBrier, founder, Richard G. Bennett, searched for a symbol to represent his years of management and service to the senior community in North Carolina. While on a long weekend in the historic district of Charleston, S.C., he found the perfect symbol, the Pineapple.

For several hundred years, the Sea Captains of Charleston returned home to their wives and families carrying treasures from their most recent voyages. By far the most popular were the most exotic of fruits, the pineapple. Pineapples were only grown in the Pacific islands of Hawaii. Either by direct voyage or by shrewd trades, these fruits could be obtained and brought thousands of miles to their homes in Charleston, S.C.

In the beginning the fruit was a sense of pride for the Captains and their families and were served fresh at "coming home parties" hosted by the Captains and their families. From there it became a symbol of "Southern Hospitality" in the Charleston community. Today, the pineapple symbol can be seen throughout the "battery" and historic areas of old Charleston in black wrought iron, wooden carvings, paintings, concrete and many other mediums.

So it appears today, and all years since the GrayBrier opened to serve residents in November of 1990, as the company symbol. It is also the revered pin that GrayBrier employees receive when they have served our residents faithfully for at least two years. It appears on many of our documents and adorns our beautiful facility in many locations. Even long-term consultants and service vendors have sought ownership to proudly wear the pineapple pin, the GrayBrier’s symbol of hospitality.