AT 66 and with a 45-year career in the whisky industry behind him, you'd be forgiven for thinking Stewart Laing is preparing to wind down his working life.

But retirement is not an immediate prospect for the Glasgow-based whisky blender and bottler. In fact, you could say he has a new lust for commercial life.

Stewart and brother Fred surprised industry watchers in May when they split Douglas Laing & Co – the family-owned bottling and blending business they had run together for four a half decades.

The brothers said the split was motivated by ensuring their children inherited an equal share of the business established by their father, and concluded that dividing its brands and assets 50/50 was the best way to go.

Stewart formed the new but similar Hunter Laing and Co, alongside sons Andrew and Scott, whose own whisky business, Edition Spirits, was rolled into the new entity.

Meanwhile, Fred retained the remaining assets of Douglas Laing and Co and is continuing to trade under the name, backed by a new team featuring daughter Cara as head of brands marketing.

Cara joined her father from her role as marketing manager for Bowmore and Glen Garioch at Morrison Bowmore Distillers.

Talking at Hunter Laing's plush new home in Glasgow's Park Circus, a short walk from the Douglas Laing HQ on Lynedoch Place, Mr Laing admitted to a degree of sadness over the split with his brother.

But he insisted he feels reinvigorated by the opportunities it has brought.

He said: "Obviously there has been an emotional sadness. I worked with my dad and I worked with my brother for 45 years. But the upside here is certainly outweighing the downside of those emotions.

"I am 66 now and I still feel I have a good number of years left in me. I have still got the buzz."

With Hunter Laing at such a young stage in its commercial life, Mr Laing said it was too early to go into detail about its plans or how different its strategy would be to the one employed at Douglas Laing.

But he did reveal that acquiring a distillery is an ambition, revealing that Douglas Laing had come twice to doing so in the past. After seeing Bruichladdich acquired by Remy Cointreau for £50 million last year, he concedes it will be an expensive business.

Mr Laing said: "We have very much got our eyes open for a distillery.

"We are even looking at the possibility of greenfield sites [but] that is not overly attractive. History and stock are the main things [we want]."

More pressing for Hunter Laing is to "solidify" its reputation in the industry, and add to its global markets.

Mr Laing has assembled a senior management team to achieve those goals, including new financial director David Armour, an independent financial advisor who worked on the demerger.

It also includes several personnel who worked with Mr Laing at his former company.

David Killin remains director of Premier Bond in East Kilbride, the warehouse inherited by Hunter Laing as part of the split from David Laing, while Joanna Fernside, a bonded and dry goods manager, will work alongside whisky manager Lorraine Gillen at the office in Glasgow.

In terms of brands, the demerger gave Hunter Laing a portfolio of blends and single malt products, all pitched at the luxury end of the market.

They include Old Malt Cask, a range of single cask bottlings, single malt range Old & Rare, Douglas of Drumlanrig, a collection of single malts backed by the Duke of Buccleuch, and First Edition Spirits, a range brought into the fold by Edition Spirits.

The company's blended products include John Player Special (made under a trademark diversification from Imperial Tobacco) and House of Peers.

In future the company hopes to gain traction in the blended malt category with new brand Highland Journey, and in grain whisky under the Sovereign label, though Mr Laing said both markets are in the early stages of their development.

He said: "We are really not looking at it for today, tomorrow or the next day. We are looking down the road.

"The grains have already developed a following and we wish to pursue and develop it.

"Equally we do not want to be all things to all men, so we focus."

Any new blends developed by the company in future will be informed by a blending book bequeathed to the brothers by their father, within which all the "clues" to creating whiskies are included.

Although the industry has seen considerable change since it was compiled, Mr Laing said the principles of good blending remain the same. He explained: "While some of the distilleries have changed since he wrote that note, by and large we tend to follow it. In terms of single malts for our bottlings, we enjoy the services of a very respected master to check and do our testing notes."

Most of the firm's whiskies are sold overseas, with Taiwan, Japan, Russia, Ukraine, Germany and the Scandinavian countries among its key markets.

As such, international travel is high on the agenda for Mr Laing and his sons.

In June, he spent 10 days in Mexico, a major spirits market, with a trip to mainland Europe next on the agenda.

He said: "In general terms we want to be out there meeting our customers, meeting new customers.

"It has always been the way we have done business – to meet, greet and establish personal relationships which will hopefully stand the test of time.

"I used to enjoy it more, I have got to be honest. If I see another airport I will probably scream, but the reality is that once I am there it is like the old warhorse scented the smell of battle.

"If I am there for business I am up for, I still enjoy the commercial challenge and I recognise the value of seeing customers on their own territory as well."

In the UK, sales are channelled through the off-trade, mostly at the high end of the market and in specialist independents.

Stockists include Harrods, Fortnum & Mason and the Whisky Shop chain.

The UK sales effort are led by director Hugh Muir, who is said to have "opened up many doors for the company".

Mr Laing added: "By and large in the United Kingdom we do not sell to the supermarkets. It is the independents we want to sell to. We have well over 100 customers in the UK."

Looking ahead, Mr Laing shares the optimism about the future for Scotch internationally, highlighting the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) and Mexico as areas of particular potential.

He added: "Greater minds than mine in the Scotch whisky industry have indicated that is the case.

"Diageo and Pernod Ricard have invested very large sums of money on additional distillation facilities and the like.

"When you consider that Scotch whisky is not even the number one whisky in the world in terms of sales, there is huge potential still out there untapped for Scotch whisky.

"The biggest selling whisky in the world is an Indian whisky – I believe it goes by the name of Bagpiper."