100 per cent proof

It is a rare moment of wry understatement from the man who tenaciously fought to raise money to buy the distillery, then closed, from Jim Beam Brands in 2000 and reinvent it as a unique example of how, as Reynier describes it, a modern whisky brand from a Victorian distillery and operating it on a Hebridean Island has changed attitudes and fundamentally altered attitudes about how the spirit can be produced.

It has been a long haul and the acquisition marks the end of what Reynier has described as "bloody hard work" and "an emotional rollercoaster".

The inevitable criticism that has followed on the heels of the deal – "another independent Scottish company lost" – is far from a surprise to a man who has consistently flown in the face of criticism, possessed of an implacable belief that his vision for the company would be vindicated.

"What makes me laugh is that our industry critics dismissed us as insignificant and predicted that it would be worth £25m – then when the offer was £58m we were criticised for taking the money from Rémy Cointreau."

In a world where minnows rarely survive the predations of leviathans, he can be be allowed some satisfaction that his vision for Bruichladdich on Islay, romantically perched on "oirthir Gael" – the coast of the Gael – on the shores of Loch Indaal has seen off the nay-sayers.

With the value of Scotch whisky exports now topping £4 billion this is an immense industry that has seen, especially since 2000, years of consolidation and acquisition during which global giants such as Diageo, Pernod Ricard and even Japanese conglomerates like Suntory were snapping up independent whisky companies.

In the face of that seemingly ineluctable tide, it must have seemed perverse a decade ago for Reynier and his investors to buy back a moribund concern from the industry and try to carve out a unique path. And it must have seemed similarly strange to some that having achieved that, and having seen sales surge by 60% against 2011 figures, that the rugged little bastion of Herbridean autonomy has been seduced down the multinational path.

It's an argument that has riven the famously obsessive whisky community: a cursory glance at blogs and other social media reveal particularly pungent opinions both in support and derogation of the decision. And for Reynier, the controversy is a wearingly familiar one. On one hand, he is damned for not toeing the corporate line; on the other, for selling, accepting an offer that vaulted over the analysts' expectations – one which will benefit not just the board but the 50 staff, also shareholders.

It's a difficult circle to square and he is honest about it. Reynier as MD was the only one of eight board directors to vote against the deal and his reticence to sell, he says, was based on the fact that "After all these years of hard slog, we were seeing exactly the kind of turbo growth that I had anticipated from the beginning – only to hand it on to other owners."

There had been a rash of corporate suitors over the past few years and given a suitable offer, it was almost a foregone conclusion that one would eventually be accepted. He believes that Rémy Cointreau's was the best he could have hoped for. "If I'd written the specification for the purchaser of Bruichladdich, they couldn't have ticked more boxes. I knew it would have to be someone from outside the whisky industry who would value what we had done in a way the industry would not have."

"Under some dynamic new management they have created something very interesting and are looking to build a group of premium spirit brands."

Rémy of course brings the kind of distribution muscle that had constrained Bruichladdich's export ambitions. "When we started we needed to turn over as much as possible – but you need a distribution mechanism and that's been in the control of the big companies who control the outlets."

He also believes that the authenticity of his product was key to Rémy's interest. "It's a big company and they could have bought anything else they wanted to – but they chose us because it's a brand with values associated around provenance and traceability, with half our barley organically grown and the other half Islay grown.

"We have worked very hard over a long period of time without seeing any return. We started to see that return last September when we were able to produce a ten-year-old whisky. This year we will have three more ten year olds and by the end of next year we will have five – all totally different in character." Innovative products include Octomore, which the company says is the world's most heavily peated whisky, created by the renowed Jim McEwan and The Botanist Gin.

There remains that note of regret. The past decade has been a remarkable personal rollercoaster. Wind back to 1985: Reynier, a fine wine merchant in London wins a tombola draw at the London Wine Trade fair. He is invited to pick up his prize in Soho and is offered a whisky tasting – a spirit with a rather "fuddy duddy" reputation.

"So I was astonished that Bruichladdich had all the qualities of a fine wine, the elegance, complexity and balance that you find in a burgundy." It was an epiphany, and after calling at the distillery while on a Scottish golfing holiday and being rudely rebuffed at the locked gates he persisted in asking the owners until they eventually relented and sold it for £6.5 million.

This rest is history – but negative reaction to the recent sale clearly rankles. "Some 99% of the value of that original price was in the whisky stock: the rest was the the building which would probably have been bulldozed and the brand was non existent. I could have sold it off, been in and out within two or three years and made a lot of money.

"But I had ideas about how you can operate a distillery on a Herbridean island and these theories have been vindicated. We now have people growing barley again; we have changed attitudes toward farming on Islay, paying people a decent price for barley to make it worth their while instead of screwing them into the ground – the standard big company practice which doesn't suit anybody except the accountants.

"People think it's been a holiday – it's been bloody awful. You are constantly trying to convince people about what you're doing. Even the board of directors – who are good businessmen – found it difficult to understand what I was trying to achieve."

And much of that was a deliberate dislocation from the perception of whisky as a drink that belonged at a Burns' Supper or in a hip flask on the hills. "Scotland can't get away from tartan bagpipes and stags heads and kilts. But it's so much more than that. Single malt isn't a hunting shooting and fishing preserve; it is a compelling drink – one of the most compelling in the world."

Though he certainly has an emotional attachment to Islay he is clear about the Bruichladdich business model, one that he believes fits the economy of the island.

"We have put £25 million into the economy, we mature and bottle and warehouse the product on site and we are the biggest employer after the state – without any subsidies. And we have proved that you can run a 21st century business from an island in the Hebrides."

While he says that Rémy will allow Bruichladdich to remain a standalone company, operated from Islay and retaining the best of its heritage and innovation, his own future is less certain.

"I may have the option to continue to be involved and Islay is an extraordinary, wild and beautiful place so I'll always keep a house here - but we'll wait and see." Presumably, to where the maverick spirit leads him.