About Us
Carolina Hosiery (formerly Koury Hosiery) was started in Burlington, North Carolina by Ernest Koury in 1945 in the basement of his parents home. Ernest had just returned home from serving in the United States Air Force. Ernest found there was a shortage of hosiery converters in the area. Most Hosiery plants were engaged in finishing first-quality of hosiery, but there seemed to be a demand for someone to finish substandard (damaged) hosiery.
Seeing the demand, Ernest would buy substandard socks from other local hosiery mills and would mend them with the help of a few ladies.
With three employees, Ernest ran the business and handled all sales and purchases. He used a local plant to dye all the hosiery and then transferred them to his home basement operation for pairing, matching and packaging. Then the hosiery was sold to local business'.
In two years, the business grew so much that more space was needed, so he built a new plant. It was located at 1147 West Webb Avenue and was over 3,200 square feet. Then two years later, he added an additional 6,000 square feet of space to accommodate the growing business. In 1955 another addition of 10,000 square feet was added. With the success of the business Maurice Koury (brother to Ernest) joined Carolina Hosiery after a tour of duty in the United States Navy to assist in managing operations.
The company altered changed its operation from substandard to making and finishing first quality hosiery in 1956.
After 60 years in business, the family owned Carolina Hosiery plant still operates approximately 350 knitting machines for thousands of styles in sizes newborn to adult now in it's 300,000 square foot facility. The plant with it's on-location dye house does custom color matching for their customers. From thread to foot, Carolina Hosiery is a complete product production facility and thrives on using materials made right here in the USA!
After production of goods is complete the finishing plant places in inventory so that delivery, on stock merchandise, can be processed on a 24-hour schedule.
Now in 2014 Ernest (95) and Maurice (84) make daily visits to the plant which is now run by their children and extended family. Carolina Hosiery has an additional division called (Jefferies Socks) located in Burlington as well. Carolina Hosiery has grown to manufacture many well known brand names such as Wrangler, Ducks Unlimited, Muck, Rocky, Realtree, & many more. Carolina Hosiery employs more than 350 people locally and the company actively supports the Burlington community.