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Season 2, Episode 3: Make Tasting Fun Again

Release Date: November 28, 2025

We’re in a period of time where the flow and feel of a tasting room is under scrutiny. Today’s wine drinkers have less time and less disposable income to visit tasting rooms, in general. It is possible a tasting room visit – which comes in many forms – can forever change an individual’s view on wine in general. With the question of whether or not tasting rooms survive our modern times, we took the time to discuss challenges and barriers we have individually experienced when visiting tasting rooms across the U.S. Overall, even as wineries look to improve sales again, there is still an incredible amount of onus on the consumer to ensure they have a good experience at a tasting room or wine event. While the industry is at a crossroads determining what today’s wine lover wants from a winery visit, this is an episode in which wineries can learn from and make small, but impactful changes in how they come across to their visitors. 

Links for things mentioned in this episode:

  • 3 Main Themes a Tasting Room Delivers to a Customer Experience
    • Good Aesthetic
    • High Quality Wine Product
      • Wines should be well made regardless of style.
    • Excellent Hospitality
      • Nice, welcoming people amongst the tasting room staff.
      • Education is important, but staff should not be pretentious.
      • Sutter Home Winery
  • Negative experiences Denise or Virginia have experienced visiting wineries:
    • Bias against age: Be careful that staff is not biased towards certain ages of people. The agism in tasting rooms is very commonplace and can vary based on the age and experiences of your hospitality staff.
    • Bias against appearance: Some wineries have staff that focus on what an individual is wearing and using that as indication for how much money an individual or group of people may have.
    • Poor signage: Some wineries may have confusing entrances to individuals that have not been at the winery before. Consider what it would feel like for an individual visiting for the first time. What does your facility need to explain to people where to go.
    • Lack of a welcome or lack of being greeted from the hospitality staff: We’re in a day and age in which going the extra mile to notice that customers are at your facility is quite important. Having greeters or a host is becoming a more common position in winery tasting rooms, especially as the integration of food or immersive experiences become more popular.
  • It is not on the consumer to create their experience. While visitors are still encouraged to check winery websites prior to visiting for the first time, wineries should take it upon themselves to ensure their staff is well trained in making people feel comfortable.
    • Winery staff should have regular hospitality training on how to have good conversations with guests. The simplest question the hospitality staff could ask is, “What brings you to the tasting room/winery today?
    • ”Tasting room staff should pay attention to what visitors do enjoy. This may go beyond asking them if they like dry or sweet, red or white. Instead, train staff to understand sensory likenesses associated with other beverages that an individual may enjoy. (Example: A) An individual person that enjoys black coffee may enjoy more tannic red wines. Ask them if this is a style of wine that may appeal to them. Or B) An individual that likes Cabernet may not know that Cabernet wines have a full spectrum of flavors and mouthfeels depending on where the grapes are grown. Allow the individual to taste 3 different wines that may be similar before having them to commit to your Cabernet or Cabernet-alternative.)
    • Do not try to trick consumers. Let the consumers guide you in what appeals to them. Many tasting room staff or hospitality staff may like training associated with understanding wine styles and consumer preferences. As an owner, improving training and education could be helpful.
    • Do not “wine-splain” to visitors. As the tasting room staff, you do not want to be the pretentious explainer of wine. Tasting room staff do not need to know everything and anything about wine.
      • “Wine Country” Movie: This movie illustrates how commonplace wine-splaining is amongst wineries and how they can come across as they are talking to customers.
      • How to answer, “What am I getting [in this wine]?” It is okay for someone on the staff to explain the variety/blend and some common descriptors while emphasizing that an individual may get something else in addition to some of those terms. The power of suggestion is incredibly strong so it is likely an individual will agree with at least one of those terms or gain some confidence in being able to describe their perceived sensory perception.
      • Keep in mind that most people focus on taste perceptions (i.e., sweet, sour, bitter, salty, and umami) and taste sensations (i.e., astringency, viscosity, heat, etc.). The art of pulling apart aroma and flavor is specific to trained wine and sensory professionals. Focusing on the flavor nuances turns many people off from enjoying wine.
    • Consider the visual associated with how the tasting room is presenting the wine to people coming to their winery. There is a lot more room, today, for being creative with how wines are presented. Glassware has an opportunity to elevate an experience.
  • Why should we not correct someone’s sensory experience or explanation (besides the fact that it is rude)?
    • Sensory science teaches us that our sensory perceptions vary from individual to individual. Perceptions are based on individual genetics and food/beverage experiences. When someone says they smell or taste vanilla in a wine, they very much may be perceiving that even if you yourself do not.
    • Additionally, an individual’s sensory vocabulary varies. Many people have their own bank of terms, based on past experiences, education, and culture, that they use to describe what they perceive or feel. The fact that two people are using different terminology illustrates this variation amongst individuals. Again, using multiple descriptors to describe a wine doesn’t make any one person wrong.
      • Denise provided an example of this when she was training a sensory panel that included some horticulturists. They had to alter their descriptors of a wine’s flavor from plant names to something else anyone could understand.
    • Tasting notes in a tasting room.
      • Humans are incredibly visual people. (We talked about this with Jayme Henderson from The Storm Cellar in Season 1, Episode 18.) Our visual feedback can bias an individual before even tasting a wine.
      • Tasting room notes do offer visitors the chance to focus on something if they do not want to engage in conversation or if they want to write something down.
      • For people who do geek out on wine, if tasting room notes look AI-generated or generic, it can come across poorly for the winery. However, if descriptions are too specific, it can be a challenge or barrier for an individual to enjoy the wine. It can also make an individual feel stupid if they do not recognize the descriptor, know what the descriptor tastes like, or trigger their “inability” to know wine. This can become, again, a barrier to an individual enjoying their wine and acts as a visual reminder that that person is “not a wine drinker.”
      • I usually tell people to market their wines in a way that we would describe the difference between Coke (Coca-Cola) and Pepsi. As we do not pull out all the aroma nuances between these sodas, a winery is encouraged to ask themselves if they really need to detail their wine beyond how they would describe a soda.

Thank you for listening to another delicious episode of Voices of the Vine. You can find show notes for our episodes by subscribing to the DGW Podcast, or by visiting the Podcast archive, both available at www.dgwinemaking.com.

We love to talk about tasting wine on this podcast. Please remember that our podcast is about wine appreciation and education, but that we both support and encourage responsible alcohol consumption. Additionally, both of us are winemaking professionals, so we do not get paid for tasting wine. All opinions expressed here on our podcast are those of ours alone.

Today’s episode is produced, researched, and hosted by both Denise Gardner and myself, Virginia Mitchell. If you enjoyed today’s episode, we’d love for you to subscribe to Voices of the Vine on your favorite podcast platform. Plus, listener reviews go a long way for podcasters. If you could leave us a review on your platform of choice, we’d truly appreciate it.

Thanks for listening.

The views and opinions expressed through dgwinemaking.com are intended for general informational purposes only. Denise Gardner Winemaking does not assume any responsibility or liability for those winery, cidery, or alcohol-producing operations that choose to use any of the information seen here or within dgwinemaking.com.