James Booth - Managing Director

James developed his taste for wine in Burgundy during a French exchange with the Rèmy family and then worked in Chablis with Jean-Marc Brocard as part of his French and Business degree.  Following career advice from his parents he embarked on a ‘proper’ career in the City. Two of those eight years were spent in South Africa where weekend activities included wine trips to the Cape, diving trips to Mozambique, canoeing and bungee jumping trips to Victoria Falls/Zambezi, and the odd bit of merger, acquisition, listing and divesting advising in between.

In July 2003 James escaped the world of finance, married Nathalie and not content with a honeymoon in Tuscany they spent the rest of the year travelling around Australia, New Zealand and Fiji.  It came as a bit of a surprise to Nathalie that much of the time was spent either in vineyards or watching rugby matches.

In 2006 New Generation Wines became James' main focus having met Anthony Record and Tim Ford, the founders of Domaine Gayda. James set about building a UK agency/importing business to represent forward thinking, family-owned, environmentally-aware producers who are at the pinnacle of wine production in their region.

Nowadays, with 2 daughters in tow, James enjoys countryside life in West Berkshire, spends plenty of time on the A roads of England visiting regional merchant customers and in his spare moments (which are few and far between) plays a bit of tennis, visits coastal mid-Wales with the family and disappears off to the mountains of Europe when the snow conditions and other commitments allow.