IN one of the stand-out events of the Trinity term, Old Oratorian Tom Laithwaite (Junior House 1995-96, Norris 97-2001) hosted a fabulous wine-tasting evening back at his Alma Mater.

And in a wide-ranging chat following a roaring success, he reflected on his time at the school, and what has followed in the past 25 years.

He began: “I was very happy to re-engage, and especially to do it through wine, because it’s the only thing I truly know about!

“Having done the full complement of seven years, The Oratory was a big part of my life.

“I wasn’t a particularly academic person – I hope the Headmaster didn’t go back and look at my grades – but I loved the camaraderie at the school.

“I asked my parents to let me board even though we lived 10 minutes down the road, because I just loved being in the environment with all my friends.

“It was the place to be, much better than being stuck with your parents – and my two older brothers eventually cottoned on and did the same.”

Certain staff members live long in Tom’s memories as he continued: “Ronnie Wormesley was someone I always got on very well with.

“He knew my dad through real tennis, and he was a very good teacher as well as a mentor.

“He got me through Ancient History, which is mostly about storytelling, and it's similar with the wine world in terms of knowing the subject and the geography.

“Another was Tommo (Paul Tomlinson), who I kept in touch with after school.

“He wasn’t my tutor, but outside of art I felt he really cared and he was very influential. We dropped some wine up at the school for his retirement do!

“In junior house I had a year with Dr Sloper and then one with Pat Thomas – it was quite contrasting. We probably butted heads a couple of times, he was a hard driver, but he was always fair.

“He also took over junior house rugby from Mr Callan, and that was a hell of a change – it was a lot tougher!

“I was telling my wife before the event about the old ‘front drive’ routine of running up and down, press-ups at the top, sit-ups at the bottom, and she said ‘what had you done wrong?’

“I had to explain it was just part of training, and you could say it made us who we are.”

On friendships made for life among his year mates, he added: “There’s a huge group of us who are still very close. We’ve got 17 on our WattsApp group, there are daily updates, and a fair few were involved at my wedding.

“Depo (Bademosi) did a reading, John Kelly, Richard Cox and Paul Binney were my best men, and Jonny Banfield was MC.”

After leaving school Tom moved into hospitality, and then as the family business was expanding, headed over to Sydney, Australia.

He explained: “I was there for four years and learnt a hell of a lot – it lit the fire.

“I’d always seen how hard my parents worked – my brothers (Henry and Will and I used to work for them in the holidays in the warehouse or doing admin, to be honest, the rubbish jobs – but going Down Under for four years showed me what it was all about.

“Meeting Australian grape-growers and wine-makers was very different. They’re farmer types, down-to-earth people with no grandeur – they don’t do that in Australia – and there were a lot more young people in the industry. For me in my mid-20s, it was perfect.

“They were having fun, doing interesting things and it’s the perfect climate. They have the weather, the soil types, and a wide variety.

“If you go down to Tasmania it’s a cooler climate, good for lighter styles and sparkling, further north in South Australia for example it’s more desert-like and you get gorgeous big, bold red wines – they can do it all.

“There’s so much to explore out there and for four years I enjoyed it a lot.”

Returning to the UK to become part of the rapidly expanding family business, Tom explained how his dad, Tony, and mum, Barbara, got the show on the road.

He said: “For the first four or five years dad only bought from Bordeaux, and then he suddenly breached out into the rest of the south of France.

“From there it steadily grew, and you could say ‘it was the right place, right time’ with the commerciality of wine production around the world.

“As people started to get their act together and made things more export-worthy, we would go there and discover them.

“When south America became more pre-eminent, South Africa opened up, there was loads more places to go.”

Tom continued: “Exploration remains a huge part of what we are and what we do – we’re always looking for new regions, producers.

“We’ve got involved with a vineyard in Uruguay recently which has been quite interesting – they’ve got a rich history of wine-making, which no-one really knows about.

“Then Moldova, not a place people would think of for wine but they’ve been granted a new official DOC status they’ve never had before, and it’s quite exciting.

“If there’s any country which has a grapevine – we average 40,000 wines a year – we’ll take a look at it.”

Key to developing things are skills Tom admitted he learnt at The OS, stating: “The environment at Oratory and learning to deal with people, it’s something you can’t not pick up – one of the most important things in life is to get along with others.

“I went from going to the local primary, home at 3pm to be with the family, to being put into a community and living amongst it all.”

Travelling round the world on business also led to Tom meeting his wife Kirsten, who showed her own expertise during his home-coming at the school.

Commenting on where is currently best for wine, he said: “My favourite place is the last one I went to! I’m very lucky because I do get to travel, but Australia always holds a special place for me.

“In recent years, though, because Kirsten is from Cape Town, we go back there a lot.

“She grew up in the vineyards around Stellenbosch and it’s a stunning part of the world, for the wine, the landscape and the people. Just warm, friendly, brilliant, but also incredibly passionate and hard-working. Thoroughly good people.

“I roped her in to speak because when (co-host) Grant and (event co-ordinator) Rachel gave me the list of wines, I saw she had actually helped make one of them, so she had to come and talk about it.”

Laithwaites growing global recognition continued with a two-time sponsorship of the England cricket team, and while Tom admitted none of the family were particularly adept with the willow, it did allow for an opportunity to meet one of the country’s greatest players.

He explained: “It was a business opportunity and good timing.

“The first was after England won the Ashes away in 2010/11 – Joe Root got his debut so a pretty important time – and we recognised the average cricket fan might also enjoy wine. Tommo might be a prime example!

“The idea you can take a bottle of wine or two into Lord’s for a Test match worked, and it was our first sort of chance at working with a brand rather than direct marketing, which traditionally we’d always done.

“It was a way of getting our name out there and it worked very well, albeit an expensive venture!

When we first announced the second partnership it was Stuart Broad and I who did it together at Lord’s and we had a fun chat.

“My brother, I and another Old Oratorian (St. John, 2000) James Williamson had just taken over The Red Lion in Peppard, and Stuart owns a couple of pubs around Nottingham.

“His first one had just burnt down, and he’d had to do a hefty refurbishment, but he’s heavily interested in wine.

“Travelling the world, they get to see places with some good vineyards – Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, all incredible wine countries.”

Tom and Kirsten are ready to move into a new house along with faithful dog Flash, but his passion for the business – and awareness of the evolution of the trade, while sticking through to the close-knit vibe of the business – shone through as he ended: “We’re very proud of what we do.

“The feedback we get from customers, it means a lot, but it’s down to the dedication of everyone involved.

“People like Grant, Rachel – she’s been with us since she was a teenager – so more than 20 years, they’re phenomenal.

“As a company we’re doing a little bit of reinvention at the moment to make sure we stay relevant to the new wine drinkers, and every day you find new excitement – discovery is key to it and such an important part of what we do.

“You can’t churn out the same stuff over and over again, otherwise people will get bored and wander off.

“Wine is a luxury item and you have to keep drawing people’s attention in – we do it by offering new things and trying to stay exciting, while also always trying to learn how to communicate with people in the new digital world.

“Believe it or not, a lot of our current customers are not on TikTok – it might not be long till they are!

“But we keep teaching ourselves new skill-sets to communicate in a different way. It’s still very fun.”