Mayo Family Winery

13101 Arnold Dr, Glen Ellen, CA 95442

Website: http://www.mayofamilywinery.com/

Mayo Family Winery has three different locations in Sonoma Valley. The main tasting room is located in Glen Ellen. Mayo Family Reserve Room is located in Kenwood and offers seated wine and food pairings. The third tasting room is part of the Cellar Door tasting room on the grounds of the Lodge at Sonoma. The Glen Ellen tasting rooms is open until 6:30 p.m., later than most other wineries. That makes this tasting room a popular spot at the end of the day.

Mayo Family Winery was founded in 1993. It is currently run by owners Henry and Diane Mayo and their son Jeffrey. The winery focuses on producing small lot, single vineyard wines. Their wines are only sold online or in one of the tasting rooms. Mayo makes pretty much any varietal of red or white wine that can be grown in Napa or Sonoma, including sparkling wine and a port.

Mayo Family Tasting Room in Glen Ellen

I visited the tasting room in Glen Ellen. From the outside it looks like a big, brown barn. There was a vintage car parked near the doorway to the tasting room. The tasting room inside is a large, open space with bright white walls and ceilings. The wood paneled tasting bar takes up one side of the room. The lighting and windows on the opposite side of the room make the space bright.

There were lots of people around the bar when I arrived but it didn’t feel crowded. The staff was friendly but we had a lot of time between each pour because the server kept leaving us to assist some other customers at the opposite end of bar. Although we understood that the other guests had arrived before us and there were too many people for us to get personalized service, we found ourselves standing around quite a while waiting for our server to come back so we could let her know what we wanted to try next. There were 10 different wines to choose from on the tasting menu. Between my husband and me, we tried 7-8 of them. My personal opinion was that the wines were not as high quality as many of the other wineries I have been to in the area. However, this winery does offer a lot of different varieties that the other wineries do not offer and their late hours make it accessible after the other wineries have closed for the day.