Greer Connection Print

Allen Cullum is the developer of Velocity Park.

My grandparents lived in Greer, SC, all their married lives.  My grandfather, B. A. Bennett, was Mayor of Greer in the 1920’s and was President of the Bank of Greer, the Citizens Building & Loan, and the B. A. Bennett & Company.  My grandmother, Lula Bennett, was a wonderful, outgoing individual and a “great” grandmother.

I spent my summers in the 1950’s and early 1960’s in Greer.  My first job was selling peaches for Earle Taylor in Greer for 50 cents an hour.

My grandfather died in 1964, and my grandmother died in 1973.  After my father died in 1985, of his 3 children, I was the only one in the real estate business, so I assumed responsibility for the family’s interests in Greer, primarily my grandparents’ 48-acre homestead on West Poinsett Street and the B. A. Bennett & Company insurance agency.

In the 1990’s and 2000’s, I developed Bennett Center, a 48-acre office park in Greer.  It is home to the Post Office, Greer State Bank, State Farm, the Greer Library, several insurance companies, an accountant, and several doctors.

In 2007, with my children now grown and working, I looked at developing industrial real estate in Greer and felt that the timing was right.  My wife and I also had bought a lot in the Cliffs at Glassy in the Blue Ridge Mountains, 30 minutes north of Greer, and I felt that having a second home there would allow me to oversee and manage the real estate developments in the Upstate area personally, not from long distance.

Since I have been coming to Greer since the early 1950’s, I know the community and its citizens well, in many cases better than current local residents, as the Bennett family was a leader within the Greer community and was friends with other civic leaders.  I continue to have very good relationships with many local Greer leaders and families and know all of the governmental and utility leaders personally.  I may be from Dallas, but I consider myself a citizen of Greer.