How to Save Money Wine Tasting

Wine tasting is my absolute favorite activity to do both locally and whenever I am traveling. However, it can get expensive if you are not careful! I try to find ways to save money while wine tasting so that I can be thinking more about the wine and not about my wallet!

These days, most wineries have a tasting fee that can range anywhere from $5 to up to $50ish at some very boujee wineries (looking at you Napa Valley!) If planning a whole trip around wine tasting, I’m sure you can imagine how this would add up very, very quickly! While I do love to splurge here and there, most of the time I am trying to follow a budget while planning a wine tasting trip!

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6 Tips to Save Money Wine Tasting

Follow these tips for wine tasting to ensure that your next adventure that is both fun and cost-effective!

1. Join a wine club

Most wineries these days offer some sort of wine club. I joined my first wine club when I first fell in love with wine tasting because the wine club’s perks included complimentary wine tasting for myself and up to three guests whenever I want! I have found that many other wineries across the United States offer very similar wine club perks.

Most of the time, the wine membership is free, but you are committed to buying shipments of their wine either bi-yearly or quarterly, so the only costs are buying a certain number of bottles (usually around 16 I’ve seen) per year.

This is a great option to save money wine tasting if there is a local winery that you plan to visit frequently and really enjoy their wine. To save on costs of the wine, you could consider splitting the membership with someone else!

2. Do research ahead of time

Planning a wine tasting trip takes a lot of preparation! Most wine regions have a website that shows all of the wineries in the area, which can help start your research into the wineries you will visit!

From there, I visit the websites for the wineries I am interested in visiting to find the tasting fee on the website. After visiting a few websites I can better gauge the “tasting fee range” that the region has, and will plan accordingly!

Travel Tip: Be sure to also determine if a tasting reservation is required and what the hours for the winery are!

3. Visit local wineries

Local wineries are fantastic! I have found that the smaller “mom and pop” type of wineries often have cheaper wine tastings and a more personable experience. Whenever I am wine tasting in a specific region I like to go to at least 1-2 local wineries, and have always had a wonderful experience there.

Some regions have a website with all of the wineries in the region, such as in Willamette Valley or Paso Robles. I usually look through the lists of wineries and try to find ones that are less well known but still with good recommendations.

4. Visit wineries that do not require a tasting

Don’t get me wrong, I love doing a wine tasting! But sometimes the tasting fee is expensive and I am left wanting to try more of a wine I had. Most tastings seem to have an allotted time for tasting without an option to stay for longer to sip on one of your favorite bottles you just had. At least for me, I like spending more time at a winery and getting to relax outside with a great bottle of time. Even though I love to do scheduled wine tastings, this can really add up in expensive if you have an entire day planned for tasting.

Now, I usually like to do some scheduled wine tastings but also look for wineries that allow you to purchase and share a bottle of wine. I have found this to be more cost-effective than buying the tasting, but finding places that allow this can sometimes be harder to come by.

I have found that wineries with larger outdoor areas with picnics will often allow you to buy a bottle to enjoy at the winery without requiring a tasting before. The wineries with smaller tasting rooms might not be able to accommodate people wishing to purchase a bottle to drink on the property.

I also will call ahead of time to see if they allow drinking purchased bottles at their winery. Not only does it save money, but it also allows you to enjoy more than just 1-2 oz of a fantastic wine. (Usually, if you are trying to decide which wine to purchase, most wineries will allow you to taste 1-2 wines prior anyways so you can pick a wine you know you will enjoy!)

5. Pack a picnic ahead of time

Packing food in advance not only saves money, but also makes a wine tasting day that much more special! I like to pack sandwiches and snacks in a cooler to bring with me on my wine tasting trip. If you follow the advice from above, this also pairs perfectly with a winery that allows you to picnic outside with a bottle of wine from their winery. Win-win!

If you want to be really fancy, you can pack cheese and cured meats too to set out a charcuterie board at your picnic! This may be my favorite tip for saving money while wine tasting!

6. Host a wine tasting event at your home

Another way to taste wine without spending a lot of dough is to host a wine tasting event at your house! You can find some great wines that are much cheaper when buying them from a local liquor store.

Grab some friends, some bottles of wine, and taste them right in your home or yard! Whenever I have done this, I like to set up the tasting outside while having the barbecue going for some tasty food too.

Wine can be enjoyed absolutely anywhere, and it doesn’t have to cost you a lot of money either!

What do you try to do to save money while wine tasting? Let me know below in the comments!