A founding member walks into a quiet Dry Creek Valley tasting room in November ready to buy a case, and walks out with nothing. Fifty years earlier, the Stanley Hotel’s last guests of the season changed everything for that hotel.
A longtime customer from Sacramento, a club member with a library pour, and a tasting room host who never saw the difference
The Walk-In Is Decided by the Host’s First Sentence By Patrick R. Dunn A guest who walks into a quiet
Keep the Person at the Door Check-in tablets and AI phone assistants save a wage at wineries and boutique hotels.
Insights Why Club Members Quit After the Pickup Party What the best fall release parties do differently, with a host
The Wine Does Not Sell Itself Plenty of wineries still run on the assumption that great wine sells itself. Tasting
Who Tells the Story While the Owner Is in the Cellar Harvest pulls the winemaker out of the tasting room
The Number Nobody Prints By Patrick R. Dunn The tasting room at Casque Wines sits on a flower farm outside
Insights Slow the Tasting Room Down on the Days It Fills Up Harvest is running early across California, the tasting
The club conversation in most tasting rooms happens only when the guest starts it. What it takes to change that: stories worth telling, a host who can read when the room will take the ask, five occasions to hold it, and a different order entirely on event days.