Being steeped in wine for most of his life has been a "labour of love" for John Angove.
The South Australian who has been appointed a Member of the Order of Australia for services to the wine industry is also celebrating the Angove Family Winemakers' 125th anniversary and 100 years of grape growing in Renmark.
"It has been a labour of love, I would do it all again," Mr Angove said of his life in the industry.
His family company began after William Thomas Angove arrived in SA in 1886 to establish a medical practice - and then began experimenting with winemaking in the Adelaide foothills. The Angove winery initially produced only red wines.
But it moved into table and fortified wines when Dr Angove's eldest son, Thomas Skipper Angove built a distillery and processing house at Renmark in 1910.
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Four generations later, John Angove is managing director and he has been chair of the wine industry technical committee for more than 20 years. It's the key body that deals with technical issues that emerge in the industry, such as the prolonged negotiations with the European Union in the 1980s and early 1990s that opened it up for Australian wine.
"It's the aspect I probably enjoyed most, the mental gymnastics of it all," he said. "My father before me was involved at an industry level so I guess I really stepped into his shoes when he decided that he had had enough of it.
"I didn't really think I would stay as long as I did but I enjoyed mixing with the other company and industry members around the table.
"I have put a lot into it, certainly it has been an enormous amount of travel and hours out of this business, but no one achieves success in isolation. There have been an enormous amount of helpers along they way."
