Laithwaite's is the biggest family-owned wine retailer in the world with a turnover in the most recent financial year of £318 million. It was famously started by Tony Laithwaite in 1969 when he drove a van back to a railway arch in Windsor loaded with wine produced by the family he had stayed with in Côtes de Castillon in Bordeaux when he was a geography student. The company has always tried to give the impression that it is basically one man and a dog sharing his wine enthusiasms. But it now runs direct retailer operations all over the globe, including...