Talon Wines at The Meadery — Attraction in Palisade

My partner and I did the winery tour followed by the tasting room. We had a wonderful time!! We chose Talon Wines because we are big fans of their mead, Meadery of the Rockies. We are from the Denver area and had tried all of their mead varieties, at least the ones we could find. We were especially interested in learning about how they make mead.

We were met outside for our arrival as it was just the two of us scheduled for the tour. Jack was our tour guide and he was a delight. We were each given a glass of wine to enjoy during the tour, I had the Lavender Riesling and my partner had the Apple Blossom. Both were fantastic! I was nervous about the lavender being too soapy or fragrant, but it was well-balanced and surprised me, especially since I am not much of a fan of traditional wines.

We saw the beautiful pecan tree outside and Jack shared the story behind the name Talon Wines. Jack was knowledgeable about the different wine making processes and it was interesting to see the various machines involved. Jack answered any and all questions and we learned many new things. Since it was just my partner and I, the tour felt very personal and it was very memorable.

After the tour, we went to the tasting room where we were served by Travis. My partner and I each did 6 tastings. We were able to share so we both got to try each other’s selections. Since we had already tried their meads, we were particularly interested in their fruit wines. We worked our way through almost all of the fruit wine list and our favorites were Strawberry Rhubarb, Pomegranate, and Blueberry. As I mentioned previously, I am not big on traditional wines but I am now a BIG fan of fruit wines!

There was also one mead on the list that we had never seen before: Honey Sheré. During the tour Jack described their special process to create this rich mead and we were eager to try it. This was our final tasting and by far our favorite! It is a lux, rich honey wine and Travis really treated us by serving us a couple of toasted pecans (from the tree out front) and pouring over some of the Honey Sheré. It was decadent. We had to buy a bottle to bring home with us since we can’t find it anywhere near us. This is our new special occasion wine!

Overall, we had an incredible time. This was very memorable and special to us, we couldn’t stop talking about our experience for several days. Jack and Travis especially contributed to our experience, it wouldn’t have been as enjoyable without them. I highly recommend Talon Wines! Thank you for the...

Our experience here was extremely disappointing. The staff is consistently confrontational and lacks basic customer service etiquette. Over the years, it’s clear their business model has shifted as they’ve realized that honoring the promises and guarantees they make to customers isn’t always in their best interest. Instead of taking accountability, they have no problem changing those promises midstream and expecting clients to simply adapt.

The wine itself was mediocre at best. After purchasing a membership, we were sent home with an uninspired and frankly unpleasant selection of overly sweet wines—some of which aren’t even produced at their own winery.

Overall, this place falls far short on integrity and professionalism. There are plenty of other wineries in the area with better products and a far greater commitment to treating customers with respect. We definitely do not recommend.

Mary, in particular, was consistently confrontational rather than resolution-oriented, and based on our experience, I wouldn’t be surprised if she responds to this review with something equally dismissive or unprofessional. I’d encourage anyone considering this winery to sort the reviews from lowest to highest—you’ll quickly see that we are far from the only customers who have encountered their lack of professionalism.

Additional reply to the owners response: Your response is not in line with Mary’s behavior and does not take accountability for the very disgusting selection of wine that you sent us home with. We were more than kind and even had to ask for kindness and professionalism in return. If you would like, I can share the text messages and have our family friend who picked up the wine for us share his experience in a separate review.

If you took one ounce of accountability or made a slight attempt to do right by us as your customers, this post would not be worth our time. Again, I am easily not the only customer that has experienced this with your establishment and that shows from your many other 1...

To preface, I have periodically been going to this winery/meadery for years and have found it an enjoyable experience…until today.

My girlfriend and I went away to the tasting room where both Travis and Caroline(?) we’re tending the tasting room. I felt we were very much ignored and perceived the body language of both staff as us annoying them and that they couldn’t wait to get us out the door. We only ended up buying three bottles of ones I haven’t tried, when I would ordinary buy 9. We were never asked if we wanted to try anything else or if we wanted anything else, once again demonstrating that they couldn’t wait to get us out.

On top of this, there were only 6 other patrons, and both Travis and caroline(?) were very chatty and good natured with the other patrons, but when it came to us, extremely annoyed and based on their body language, couldn’t wait for us to leave.

We did nothing (I feel) that warranted this treatment, as I had to make eye contact to tell them (after being ignored for some time) in order to get assistance. There was no communication to us to give them a minute to prepare our flights, or the time it took them to even take our order of flights, which to me should be standard customer service 101.

I know this was long winded, but deeply saddened and let down by this experience, as os...