Her first day at Gray was April 1, but it wasn’t a joke. Mary is an invaluable member of our team. She started as an administrative assistant and is now one of our LEED Accredited Professionals. Mary is a huge fan of Kentucky basketball. She runs our office NCAA pool and even signed up for Twitter just to follow Kentucky basketball. Go Cats!

“I followed Guy Bowman, a co-worker at a small engineering company in Lexington, to Gray back in 1997.

At the time, Howard Gray was president of the company. He had a tradition of welcoming each new team member into the Gray family by meeting with them one-on-one. I was nervous about this. What would I talk with Mr. Gray about? Well, I quickly found out that he was Howard, not Mr. Gray. He put me at ease immediately. He was so relatable and genuine. He told me something that I have never forgotten. He told me he wanted to give our customers what they wanted “and just a little bit more.”

I worked as an Administrative Assistant and a Senior Administrative Assistant until 2006, when I was promoted to Project Coordinator.

It’s funny how one seminar can change your career path. In 2008, I attended a seminar called “Building to LEED.” At the time, I didn’t know what LEED was or why I was going other than the fact that Gray had paid for a number of seats and bodies were needed to fill them.

My supervisor, Phil Seale, thought that I had gone as far as I could in my current position and he encouraged me to pursue LEED accreditation, which would be a benefit for both me as well as our business unit.

It was an extremely tough exam and I had to isolate myself in one of our “quiet rooms” for nearly six weeks to learn the material. In January 2009, I passed the LEED exam.

My first project as a LEED AP was the Kentucky Eagle Beer Inc. distribution facility in Lexington. I’m proud to say that we have received LEED certification. Kentucky Eagle is the first LEED® certified Anheuser-Busch distribution center in the U.S.”