How a winery can get more tasting room bookings

Tasting room bookings start long before a guest walks in the door. Most guests choose a winery on their phone, often the night before or in the car. The wineries that make booking quick and easy get the visits.

Here is how to get more of those bookings, and how to make each visit count.

Make booking take less than a minute

Count the taps it takes to book a tasting on your website. Start on a phone, from your homepage. If it takes more than a minute, you are losing guests. Quick booking is one of the basics every winery website needs.

A good booking setup has:

• A Book a tasting button at the top of every page
• Open times shown on a calendar, not a request form
• Clear prices and what each tasting includes
• Booking without creating an account
• A confirmation message right away

Email and phone bookings still have a place for large groups. For everyone else, a request form that waits for a reply sends guests to the next winery on the road.

Show up when people search

Many guests search for “wineries near me” or “wine tasting” plus your area. Google Business Profile decides much of what they see.

Keep your profile current:

• Set hours for each season, and update them before each change
• Add a booking link that goes straight to your booking page
• Post fresh photos of the tasting room, the view, and the people
• Answer every review, good or bad, in a friendly voice
• Add your tasting options and prices

Your website should match your profile. If the hours differ between the two, guests stop trusting both.

Offer more than one kind of visit

One standard tasting fits one kind of guest. Offer a few options at different prices:

• A quick standard tasting for guests on a tour route
• A seated tasting with food for guests who want to stay
• A vineyard walk or cellar tour with the winemaker or a guide
• A private tasting for groups, birthdays, and work events

Higher priced experiences fill fewer seats but earn more per guest. They also attract the guests most likely to join the club.

Cut no shows with deposits and reminders

No shows cost you staff time and seats you could have sold. Two simple tools cut them down.

Take a small deposit at booking, and apply it to the tasting or a bottle purchase. Guests who pay something up front show up more often.

Send a reminder the day before, with directions and parking details. Include a link to change the booking, so guests who cannot make it free up the seat instead of skipping it.

Work with the people who send guests

Hotels, tour companies, and nearby restaurants send guests to wineries every day. Make it easy for them to send guests to you.

Give front desk staff and tour operators a simple booking link and a one page sheet with your hours, experiences, and prices. Invite them in for a tasting once a season. People recommend places they have visited.

Your regional wine association and tourism board also list wineries for visitors. Check that your listings are current and link to your booking page.

Fill the quiet months

Summer weekends fill themselves. The off season takes a plan.

Run events that give people a reason to visit in the cold months: library wine tastings, food pairing nights, blending sessions, or holiday gift shopping. Announce them first to your email list and wine club. Put each event on your website with its own booking link.

Turn every visit into a club member

A booking is only the start. The guest who leaves with a bottle and no club membership may never come back.

Train your team to mention the club during every tasting. Waive the tasting fee for guests who join that day. Send a thank you email the day after each visit, with a link to the club and the wines they tasted. Guests decide to join while the visit is still fresh.

Track what works

Your booking tool and website should tell you where bookings come from. If you also sell online, your store platform can report on both. We compared the two main choices in Commerce7 vs WineDirect for a Canadian winery. Track bookings from your website, from Google, and from each partner. Then put more time into the sources that send the most guests.

If your website makes booking hard, start there. A Lark winery website includes tasting, tour, and event bookings built into every page, at a published price.