I have been 'outed' – I think that's the term – by Jancis Robinson in the FT.

So I had better make a clean breast of the whole thing. You see I am not what you think I am; this bloke who runs a wine business.

Jancis has now told the world I am not the clever one. I don't 'run' Laithwaites Wine. Actually I never have. Except for a brief period in the Sixties when I was a good old fashioned, loss-making, one-man-band, nice-but-dim, British Wine Merchant.

Then I fell for Barbara. She had great legs and a great brain. I just wanted the legs at first. But you know how it is. The deal was I had to take the whole package.

Barbara married me, took over me, and my company and everything. Except, luckily, the wine. (She still prefers a G&T!) My mother - a rather dominant influence in my life - encouraged the match because she reckoned her only child marrying a very bright girl would get her some intelligent grandchildren. So my secret is out and it’s Barbara.

I have met many other excellent wine merchants over the years but none of them had a Barbara - except one ... David Thomas in Australia had one and did very well indeed!

So...

I have been left driving around vineyards buying and writing about wine. Fundamentally, that is what I still do, but ... things have happened. Big things. Not down to me always.

Perhaps I have certainly been remiss in not telling you about these things.

But I thought that a) you just wanted to hear about the wines and b) I was worried that you might go off me!

There's the size thing too.

I preach that in wine small is beautiful. It is. Small wine estates are best. And I have always seen myself as – and written in the manner of – the small, upstart, outsider of the wine trade.

So it is seriously worrying therefore, that Jancis 'outs' me as the biggest wine merchant in Britain (yes, but Tesco and Sainsbury’s do sell considerably more wine). I don't feel it. Nor does Barbara or any of our colleagues (but then there are 1000 of them … which means – in the little old wine trade – HUGE!) But I want to assure you I am still basically actually what you think I am; a bloke who goes round vineyards buying wine and delivering it. Just not all in one van anymore.

Getting The Sunday Times Wine Club deal in 1973 and meeting up with Hugh Johnson took us rapidly out from under our Railway Arch and into serious business.

Year after year we just grew - a bit, not a lot. Barbara always preferred 'safe and steady' so that's how we went along; slowly.

I'd have been more reckless but slow is OK when you just love the work anyway as the journey, you find, can be more fun than the destination.

Yes we had our health problems and had to hand over the daily running of our darling business to a team of professional managers. Can't say it was all smooth sailing but they certainly grew the business.

It was all organic growth too ... until recently we had the idea of buying some other businesses. Not because we feared them. More to get ourselves an injection of fresh ideas, talent and energy.

Today, the overseas companies are our new babies. They've given some of our best people the indescribably scary thrill we once had of boldly going off to start up a business from a tiny office where everyone sits on wine boxes and works madly, day and night … with no guarantee of success, lots of problems and hassle. But when it works!!!!! Sheer joy.

So, yes, our Ade is in the States running The Wall Street Journal Wine Club. Our Andrew is the voice behind 'Wine People' in Australia and soon Hong Kong. And there's Germany and Switzerland.

You can find Laithwaites wines in all sorts of places like Trinidad, Barbados, Denmark and Cyprus.

But I assure you its still very much 'us' and will be as long as our brains can cope. Then there's the next generation. They didn't always like our Company. But they do now.

Have a look at what Jancis wrote. She's a sweetie, really. Like to give a chap the odd clip on the ear but then that's the only way some of us get motivated.