In his early twenties Gordon joined the family sherry business Luis Gordon & Sons as a salesman and in 1971 became Chairman. The Company was sole importer of the Domecq range of sherries.
Under Gordon’s reign the company became the biggest player in the fast-expanding UK sherry market with the distinction of receiving a Royal Warrant from the Queen and also from King Alfonso of Spain.
The company back in the 1960s was among the first to embrace the spirit of corporate entertainment, typically hiring a Comet to take more than 200 guests on wild trips to Jerez, an awesome combination of wine traders, publicans and journalists. Typically these three-day marathons would end with a demonstration of small-scale bull fighting – testing out young, but fierce animals – in a private ring on the Domecq estates. When Gordon judged that his watching guests had sipped enough sherry he’d invite them to have a go themselves as matadors, roaring with laughter as tipsy hacks staggered about waving handkerchiefs and diving for cover. Once he took over the rooftop of the five-star Hermitage Hotel in Monte Carlo for the annual Powerboat Race. Only halfway through lunch the claret seemed in short supply. Gordon summoned the waiter for more wine to be told: “But Sir, we have run out of Latour”.
