What tourism downturn? Napa wineries report off-the-charts demand for $500-plus tastings

A $ 550 flight over the Carneros vineyards in a vintage airplane. Glasses of champagne on a limo ride to a winery from $ 850. Private tutorials with Wine Country Chefs on Mozzarella Pulling. And for another $ 750 baccarat crystal glasses engraved with your name.

These are just a few of the extravagant wine tastings currently on offer in the Napa Valley – and according to winemakers, the demand for them has never been higher. Some wineries offer tastings that cost $ 500 or more, and concierges that charge more than $ 1,000 a day are hiring to keep up with requests from people wanting unique – and private – experiences .

Lindsay Johnson and Mike Lefeld from Chicago celebrate their engagement with a tasting at Theorem Vineyards in Calistoga.

Alvin AH Jornada / Special on The Chronicle

“June is usually not a big month for wine hospitality here, especially for high-end reds,” said Tim Martin, owner of Tusk Estates and Immortal Estate, which are currently offering a $ 550 tasting. “But inquiries are off the charts. I haven’t seen traffic like this for years. “

With California pandemic restrictions ending and the weather heating up, it’s no surprise that Tourists flock to the wine country. But this version of wine tasting is a far cry from what the crowds who pop into the bustling tasting bars along Highway 29 experience. Bills for these high-end Napa trips can easily add up to tens of thousands of dollars; Some winemakers were even surprised at how quickly their most expensive offerings were selling, given the economic impact of the pandemic.

Tor Kenward, owner of Tor Wines in St. Helena, didn’t expect a big rush when he started running a new premium wine tasting called the Black Magic Experience last year. For $ 950 per person, visitors can tour wineries with marquee names like After Kalon, Vine Hill Ranch and Dr. Crane, whose fruit flows into his Black Magic Cabernet. Given the high price, Kenward thought it would take time to pique interest in the wine tasting. And yet: “We have a much greater demand than we can currently meet,” he says.

At Theorem Vineyards in Calistoga, champagne is poured into fine crystal flutes.

Alvin AH Jornada / Special to The Chronicle

It’s a sharp turn from recent fears that the valley is turning into a Tourism downturn by the COVID-19 crisis and the Forest fires 2020. Now the air is clear that Evening sky of 2020 a distant memory. The rich seem eager to spend their money in the Napa Valley.

That there is cash for such luxurious leisure activities could be due to the larger economic patterns of the moment: According to the Institute for Policy Studies, America’s billionaires increased their wealth by 45% in the first 12 months of the pandemic. But there is also some catching up to do with non-billionaires who are willing to travel and spend some money again. Theorem Vineyards on Diamond Mountain in Calistoga is receiving more tasting requests than it can hold, says owner Kisha Itkin.

That goes for the standard experience at Theorem, which includes a tour, tasting of three to four wines, and a cheese platter (150-250 USD), as well as the more expensive offerings: a tasting that includes a limo ride from home or hotel with Champagne followed by a private food-and-wine couple ($ 850-1,500 per couple, depending on route); and the Theorem Vineyards Baccarat Experience, which features a custom engraved crystal wine glass from the French company Baccarat ($ 750 per person).

Theorem receives more tasting requests than it can hold, says owner Kisha Itkin.

Alvin AH Jornada / Special to The Chronicle

A persistent desire for social distancing can also contribute to the high demand: a private experience may now require an extra charge. “People are definitely willing to pay a little more because it’s so private,” said James Cerda, vice president of sales and marketing at Theorem.

With many Americans still suspicious of international travel – and many countries still not open to tourism – domestic destinations like Napa and Sonoma are likely to receive some of that summer travel. And many of those who travel there probably want to do something special. Experts say that people with the end of the pandemic look out more adventurous, once in a lifetime experiences, maybe because COVID was such a powerful reminder of our mortality.

Angela Dürr, owner of A Cultured Vine concierge service, which plans luxury experiences in Napa Valley, says interest in high-end experiences in Napa is the highest in years. “It’s as if you turned the taps on properly,” says Dürr. She had to hire a new employee last month just to keep up with the requests.

Durr’s customers, she says, aren’t happy to do the same wine tasting as they did on their last trip to Napa – nor do they want something that can be arranged through a Wine Country booking service like CellarPass.

“I have to come up with things that I couldn’t have done on my own,” says Dürr. “It could be something like this: let’s get into a helicopter, take a ride, land next to a vineyard, now you’re under this 500-year-old oak and it’s nothing but you and the vintner and a table that is already set up. “

An outdoor seating area at Theorem Vineyards offers views of the vineyards.

Alvin AH Jornada / Special to The Chronicle

This is what customers pay for: Dürr recently planned a trip for a 10-person group with a total cost of around $ 80,000 and another for a group of three couples that ended up costing almost $ 40,000, including the airfare. Contributing to these bills are a rental apartment or hotel, private cooking dinner, and Dürr’s own fee, which starts at $ 1,600 for two days of trip planning for up to four people. (For larger groups, it starts at $ 2,200.) These sums also reflect the expectation that a group will spend at least $ 2,000 on wine at every winery it visits.

For winemaker Shannon O’Shaughnessy, tourists’ desire for special additions helped fuel her new wine brand, Aileron Estates, which launched during the pandemic. As a pilot who loves flying, she started offering double-decker flights in addition to tastings. For $ 550, you can get about 20 minutes in the air – complete with some wacky “aerobatics” if you want – in vintage open-cockpit planes. (It gets quite noisy, warns O’Shaughnessy.) Packed lunches are available at an additional cost. Later, head to Brasswood, St. Helena, where she hosts tastings.

“Small wineries usually vie for attention and try to get people to do tastings,” she says. “And now I have so many inquiries that it feels like a full-time job.”

It is possible that Napa’s current luxury tourism boom is a bubble and it could burst. The region’s famous wine industry faces many obstacles: It is Struggle to attract millennials, and Total wine consumption Doesn’t grow in the US when the 2021 fire season – the could be serious in California – was just as detrimental to the grape harvest as it was the 2020s, which could seriously damage the Napa Valley economy. The area’s prestige may be strong enough to withstand such a crisis, or interest in its fancy wine excursions may wane.

But for now, these upscale experiences point to the evolution of wine sales. Luxury wine customers are less likely to buy wine unseen than they would have been in the past, when a rating of over 90 from a trusted reviewer was sufficient. Today, these customers want to stroll through the vineyard, spend time with the winemaker, and snap memorable photos before buying. Helicopter flights and engraved crystals sweeten the deal.

Still, some of the new high-end offerings are old-fashioned: just tastings of expensive wine.

Immortal Estate, which is calling its new $ 550 offering a 100 point experience, includes a tasting of four wines, bottles that sell for $ 75 to $ 303. The appeal, says Martin, the owner: Two of these wines were rated with 100 points by the Wine Advocate. The $ 550 fee is a hefty fee for four servings, but Martin says it’s meant to signal that this is only for die-hard wine collectors.

“In order to be able to pull out of our library,” says Martin, “a kind of fee has to be due to separate the looky-loos from the people who mean business.”

Kenward, owner of Tor Wines, says people – including customers – are even telling him to charge more for wine. (Its most expensive wine, the $ 450 Black Magic, recently got a wave of publicity following golfers Phil Mickelson drank it from a trophy In an Instagram video.) At some point, says Kenward, a friend of his “who sells wine to black cards” persuaded him to charge $ 155 for a Chardonnay, as opposed to Kenward’s typical $ 85. All 90 cases were sold out in one day, which surprised even Kenward, who admitted that it is always a shock when an expensive wine sells out so quickly.

“A lot of people predicted that we would have our Roaring Twenties after the pandemic, and maybe they’re right,” says Kenward. “But to be honest, it feels a little crazy.”

Esther Mobley is the San Francisco Chronicle’s wine critic. Email: emobley@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @Esther_mobley