Antinori nel Chianti Classico — Attraction in San Casciano in Val di Pesa

Worst winery experience ever.

We booked the tour and thought we’d enjoy a 2 hour experience walking through the vineyards and the beautiful property / winery and drinking wine.

instead - we were brought inside, into a cold dark building. We were talked at for over 2 hours without a sip of water and NO wine in sight. They sat us in a theatre and showed us a documentary. They spoke about the family tree, didn’t know the answers to any questions we had and just gave us a very kindergarten level of information on the process of making wine - not even unique to their own wines just literally how grapes ferment lmao not kidding !!!

They walked us through the dark cold cellars, and explained how the tubes worked. They spoke about different grapes and wines without actually letting us taste anything. For 2 hours they breadcrumbed us talking about the “tasting” at the end, for two full hours. If we even wanted to use the washroom they escorted us and waited for us. It felt like we were trapped in Bowsers castle.

when we finally got to the tasting - they didn’t allow us to sit outside in the beautiful sun or even enjoy the property. They brought us back into the dark cellars and poured us 5 glasses. They spoke again at us briefly about the wine and asked us what one we liked - they gave us less than 5 minutes to even taste the wine and than the tour guide stood at the door huffing and puffing waiting for us to leave so we didn’t even drink the wine because we were so rushed. They didn’t give any cheese or anything just some thin dry breadsticks.

we even asked (begged) if we could sit outside and drink wine we offered to buy a bottle they said no. That wasn’t allowed. They said you can stand in the gift shop and drink wine but you cannot take the wine outside. ?????? The entire experience was awful. I don’t understand why have such a beautiful property and then not allow your guests in any capacity to enjoy it. It was such a waste of time and money. We tried to speak to them about this and asked if we could go outside and they said no they said this is about wine I said amazing I’ve been here for 2 hours and I haven’t even been given a sip of wine.

it truly felt like we were being held hostage. I’ve been to winery all over the world and this was hands down the worst experience ever and ruined a whole day of our trip. Do not...

Not bike friendly - I was doing a short bike tour around the area which is ideal for bike tourism, unfortunately on arriving at the gate we we told you can't ride your bike up to the visitor area, you have to leave it in the external visitor car park down the road. I spoke to the gate staff who were nice but not flexible. I decided I was not going to leave the bike at the car parking as it is not secure and the bikes are worth 15,000 euro.

So I called the main number of the winery and asked the staff member that answered about the issue, after insisting a bit ( alot), she put me on hold and came back to me and told me that we could go up, the gate people will tell you to leave the bikes in a specific spot. (which was good and hidden).

This was happening whilst I was standing in the rain at the gate on the phone trying to sort it out (I had to insist on the phone). In the mean time, delivery vans, 4x4 SUV's and various other large vehicles were free to drive by up to the visitor area.

It strikes me that it's absurd that this place is not bike friendly with no provision for safe bike parking in an area that's aimed at tourists. Lots of people do bike tours in the area who are very wealthy and highly likely to spend money on good wine...

The functionary staff were actually nice and did what they could, but they cant help the absurd decisions of their managers.

If you are rich with a 4x4 its ok here, but rich with an expensive bike then good luck... ;-) In 2023 Everywhere should be bike friendly, especially with the point of environmental good practices. So if I was tracking their ESG rating I would say they need some better policies on sustainable transport.

You can't have shuttle vans sitting in the car park below, engines running wasting fuel and banning bikes going up to the visitor area in 2023... even if the wine is good, the fact I had to "push" this point is a bit absurd.

Anyway, The one star review is for the managers who made these absurd decisions not the normal staff who have to enforce them. Thank you to the staff that allowed us up this time.

By the way I am a bike journalist and considering this I would like them to respond with their take on the attitude to bikes in...

Overall great experience at the Antinori and it is a shame I am leaving 2 star reviews.

So in September 2023, I had the great tour, great restaurant experience, then I proceeded to buy some wines at the shop. It was close to 6pm that day and with lots of bag and bottles of wines, filling out some custom forms, I accidentally left the wallet at the counter of the shop.

Now I hadnt realized until next day that I had left the wallet, and thankfully get a call from Antinori, and go back the next day to find 500Euro cash was gone and only the wallet had been found. I am responsible for leaving it behind of course, but given this took place end of the day with not many people in the shop and knowing there are CCTVs by cashier, I was hoping they would be helpful by checking (I didnt need to see) but they asked me to go to police for filing the case. Though they kindly gave me local police address, being a foreigner and tourist, was hoping they can help but instead only they can access and by the way, records will be deleted in 72hrs.

I did in fact go to police and filed but obviously it is low shot attempt, and looking back, again it is my fault but think Antinori could have acted differently rather than asking me to go to police who barely spoke English.

Bottom line is, they told me this is 2nd time in 10yrs this has happened, and I had asked them to train their employees to remind guests to take belongings especially when they deal with lots of papers/wines/bags as least thing to help guests to finish with wonderful experience.

While I appreciate the hospitality manager trying to help, in the end my feeling for Antinori m, bot as wine producer, but customer relations...