Frank Family Vineyards — Attraction in Calistoga

My wife and I went to Frank Family Vineyards on Tuesday 8/8/2023 as we have enjoyed their "green label" wines that you can buy at you can find at a high quality wine store or restaurant. We went to Napa Valley on a 4 day weekday trip trying to avoid the larger crowds on the weekends. We had a wonderful experience with Tom Schetter as our host. Given the small crowds of a weekday visit Tom was able to essentially be our private host. Sitting on the porch was a quite and beautiful setting to enjoy their sparkling and reserve wines.

The 2019 Rouge sparkling wine was a neat find and you can't find it on their website and the 2017 is sold out. We bought several to serve over the winter holidays.

My wife and I are not big fans of chardonnay, but we really enjoyed the 2020 Lewis Vineyard Chardonnay, which was not overly oaky, too fruit forward, or too buttery. Just an excellent overall balanced chardonnay which is hard to find. If you're willing to pay $85 for a chardonnay I'd recommend it. We purchased a couple for special holiday occasions where a food course may pair well with a white wine, so we can actually enjoy a chardonnay at a nice holiday dinner.

We have always enjoyed the "green label" red wine varieties from their zinfandel to the cabernet sauvignon, so it was no surprise that we enjoyed their reserve red wines. The 2019 RHF Cabernet Sauvignon and 2018 Winston Hill were excellent, which we purchases as well.

Overall we did not have a wine that we did not like and Frank Family Vineyards was our favorite winery with regards to the taste of the wine across the entire tasting. A week day visit allowed for essentially a private wine tasting which certainly added to the experience. We look forward to returning in the future and would strongly recommend a visit to the Frank...

I am a journalist from the east coast writing an article for a major newspaper on my first experience in the Napa Valley. I did diligence on all the vineyards and chose, as one of my visits, the Frank Family vineyard for a tasting because I felt it would be a good experience. From my research I read that this vineyard gives good value. I am a novice at this but had already been to a few tastings before arriving at Frank Family. The day before,my husband and I had visited the small winery, Failla and it was marvelous, relaxed and very enjoyable. The Frank Family tasting could not have been further from that. It was, in a word, awful. It left us feeling totally "ripped off" and prey to a lot of hype. Very very commercial. The environment was like walking into a bank. We paid for the tasting and were immediately hustled up to a bar where Rob Crane could not have cared less about us, telling us about the wine or, in fact being there. He did spend time telling us about himself and how he only works three days a week and is close to retirement. He should do the vineyard a favor and do it sooner rather than later. After pouring each tasting he left us alone - presumably to do personal things, or what??? We learned nothing about the wine. We did end up buying a case to have sent home, but only because we had had several of their wines in restaurants. We had the wine sent to arrive 6 months later (due to my travel schedule) and were refused when asked if they could charge us when the wine was being sent since it would be 6 months later. The entire experience makes me angry when I think about being there. I will cool down before writing about this...

Absolutely love Frank Family’s wine but we’ve had the worst experience since joining their wine club which is very disappointing considering the amount of money we and our guests have spent. Planning to cancel as soon as we are able to.

Frank Family is on many Napa Valley best of lists for being dog-friendly which we saw as a selling point to become members. We showed up with our pup for an outdoor picnic reservation and were told no dogs were allowed that we either had to leave or put our dog in the car. Another couple showed up right after us and had the same issue. Please ask to be removed from all of these lists since you no longer allow dogs!!

You aren’t able to customize your wine club allocation and this wasn’t clearly communicated when signing up. Every other winery we’re members at allow you to customize shipments. I also called and requested our allocation be held for pickup but received a shipment notification followed by a message saying it couldn’t be delivered. We have yet to receive our wine or to have my multiple phone calls or emails returned. They also charge members for their pickup party.

Overall, terrible wine club member treatment/experience and not enjoying the changes...