The Story in the Glass
Guided tastings, corporate events, and wine country trips.Most guided tastings are a list. Four wines, four sets of descriptors, a room that nods along and has forgotten all of it by dinner.
I pick wines that have a story behind them. Who farmed it, who decided what and when, what the year did to the fruit and what somebody did about that in the cellar. That is what the time gets spent on.
I don’t run through tasting notes. Everyone’s palate is different, and a room usually holds someone on their first flight sitting next to someone who has been drinking seriously for thirty years. Telling both of them what to taste serves neither. Telling them where the wine came from, and what it cost somebody to make it that way, gives them each something to do with their own glass.
There are no tasting cards.
What I do
The Private Tasting
For a birthday, an anniversary, a holiday table, a group of friends who want an evening that’s actually about something.
Where your home, a private dining room, a rented space.
Size four to twenty.
Runs around ninety minutes, and longer if the room wants it to.
The wine you buy it. After we talk about who’s coming and what they usually drink, I send you a list of four specific bottles and where to find them. Nothing on the list is hard to get, and nothing is expensive for the sake of being expensive.
An evening that teaches without feeling like a class. Four wines that have something to say to each other, and the reason each one ended up in the glass the way it did. People leave knowing why they liked what they liked, which is the part that sticks.
Fee: $500 for up to twelve. $800 for thirteen to twenty. Travel outside Reno-Sparks at cost.
Wine Education
For someone who wants to actually learn, on their own or with friends. No prerequisite. Starting from zero is where most people begin.
Where your home, a private room, or a video call.
Size one to twelve.
The wine you buy it, from a list I send ahead. A session on labels and buying can run over video with no wine at all.
Covers what people actually get stuck on. How to read a label and know what it’s telling you and what it isn’t. How to pick a bottle in a shop or off a restaurant list without overpaying or defaulting to the second-cheapest red. How to think about pairing when the old rules stop applying. And how to taste properly, meaning what the swirl is for, what order to pour in, and how to tell what you like from what you’ve been told to like.
The private tasting is an evening with people in it. This is a session with a syllabus. Some people want the dinner party. Some people want to stop feeling stupid in front of a wine list.
Fee $350 for a single session up to twelve. A series is quoted.
The Corporate or DMC Tasting
For an offsite afternoon, a client dinner, a board retreat, a conference breakout. For a destination management company or a hotel, the slot on the agenda that keeps defaulting to a bus and a winery tour.
Where a ballroom, a private dining room, a barrel room, a crush pad. Indoors works, so the weather can’t take the day.
Size up to sixty. A second session the same day handles a bigger group.
Runs around ninety minutes, compressing when the agenda is tight.
The wine it runs through the venue’s own beverage program, so it bills as F&B and nobody has to reconcile a wine invoice against a facilitator fee. A partner winery supplying the pour is the other route, and it’s often the better one.
Requires a handheld or lav mic for groups over thirty. No slides, no screen.
I can also build the event itself rather than just the tasting inside it: the winery partner, the format, the venue coordination, and the story that holds the evening together.
Fee $3,500 flat, up to sixty guests. $1,500 for a second same-day session. Travel at cost. Full event builds quoted separately.
The Wine Country Itinerary
For anyone planning a wine trip who doesn’t want to spend three weeks guessing which appointments are worth the drive.
What you get the route, the winery appointments booked, the order they happen in, and notes on why each one is on the list and what to ask when you get there. Built around what you actually drink, not a top-ten list.
How I pace it four winery stops in a day is the ceiling, and three is usually better. Past that the palate is gone and so is the point of going. Every itinerary I build assumes a driver or a designated driver, and I’ll arrange the car if you want me to.
Regions most of what I build is California: Russian River Valley, Alexander Valley, Sonoma Coast, Napa Valley, Amador County, Paso Robles. Anywhere in the world is on the table.
Fee $350 for a single region. Longer trips and multi-region routes quoted separately. Lodging is not included, and that’s on purpose. Lodging is where I can get you upgrades, amenities, and rates you can’t book yourself, and it runs through my travel practice instead. Book the lodging through me and the fee comes off.
Travel arranged as an independent travel advisor of Fora Travel.
The Wine Country Trip
For a couple, a family, a small group who want the whole thing handled.
What you get everything in the itinerary, plus lodging, transport, restaurant reservations, and the pieces that go wrong when nobody’s watching them.
With me on it optional. If you want a host, I come along. Not as a tour guide, which is a separate license and a different job. As the person who knows why those particular appointments are on the calendar in that order and can talk about what’s in the glass once you’re standing there.
How it gets booked Lodging goes through Fora first. That’s where the upgrades, the property credits, and the amenities come from, and they cost you nothing on top of the rate. When a property isn’t in the program, and small wine country inns often aren’t, I book it direct or through another source and tell you which one it is.
How it gets paid I don’t handle your money. Lodging, cars, and anything else I book go through the supplier’s own payment link, in your name and on your card. Winery fees, restaurant bills, and some experiences are paid on site when you get there. What I invoice for is my time.
Fee quoted once the shape of the trip is set. Hosted trips are quoted separately.
Travel arranged as an independent travel advisor of Fora Travel.
True of all of them
I don’t sell wine. No fee on this page includes a bottle. You buy it, or the venue does, or a winery brings it. That’s why the wine is named on every card above.
A winery pouring for you. For the right room I can bring in a producer to pour their own wines and speak for them, at a private table or a corporate event. I have direct relationships with winemakers in Russian River Valley, Alexander Valley, Sonoma Coast, Napa Valley, and Amador County, and connections past those. Nobody explains a wine like the person who decided when to pick it, and a guest who has met the winemaker buys differently for the rest of their life.
Credentials that matter to a venue. WSET Level 3, and I hold the alcohol service certifications required in both Nevada and California.
Who runs it
I spent more than a decade as a National Park Service interpretive ranger at six sites, standing in front of people who had no obligation to care about anything I said. That’s where the format comes from. Reading a room, knowing when to talk, knowing when to stop, and finding the one detail that makes the rest of it land.
Author of Stop Leading on Empty, published by Archway/Simon & Schuster in 2026. I write about wine for Edible Reno-Tahoe, Senior ResQ, and Edible San Fernando Valley, and I publish the Pour Story Society newsletter.
Based in Sparks, Nevada. I travel.