Owen Roe — Attraction in Union Gap

Our first visit since the original family repurchased the winery. I’ll give the good, the bad, and the ugly.

The Good: All their wines are solid. You won’t find a bad or undrinkable wine here. Some are excellent.

The Bad: While their wines are solid, this still isn’t the Owen Roe of 25 years ago. Their good wines are over-priced and their very good wines are exorbitantly priced relative to similar quality at other wineries (and yes, other wineries also make excellent wines too). We tasted their $85 wines and, while lovely, aren’t at the $85 quality. There is a limit and for your wines to stand out at $80+ it needs to be life altering. These aren’t. Their $20-$35 wines are much more reasonable but no longer outshine many other local wineries.

Owen Roe seems to be living off their reputation of the past, but their wines haven’t kept up and other wineries have improved dramatically in the past twenty years. Maybe the family will be a bit more realistic in the future.

The Ugly: As wine snobs and frequent wine tasters and buyers, we are seeing an ugly trend in the entire wine tasting experience, and Owen Roe is a prime example. 1.) They charge $20 per tasting, and 2.) They don’t waive it until you’ve purchased at least $40 in wine. Yes, I’m still bitter that tastings are often no longer free, and recognize that a small fee is probably reasonable. But wineries are often charging $10 or more and not waiving with a one bottle purchase. The tasting alone at Owen Roe was not a $20 experience nor $20 worth of wine. We had to buy two bottles before they would wave the fee. The Owen Roe tasting would be much more palatable at $10 and waived with any single bottle purchase. We left with a sour taste in our mouths and are pretty sure we’ve now scratched Owen Roe off our list of wineries to track.

Their wines are good, but not good enough to merit the hassle and price of tastings. It’s sad too because we used to...

POOR Customer Service - Taylor! Wine membership trouble!

I signed up for a membership because, at the time, was planning my move to Arizona come late July. AZ wine does not compare to WA State wine.

I didn’t have a shipping address and was told that I could provide that later and not to worry about the Summer shipment because it’s too hot to ship to AZ. Well, I received an email about my shipment and noticed it was shipping to my old WA address. I immediately contacted Taylor and explained that I have been in hotels & Airbnb’s and I didn’t have my AZ address yet and requested to cancel my membership. She said that I couldn’t cancel and to let her know when I had an address. They shipped anyway. Now I have a $240 shipment going to a vacant WA address! VERY unprofessional in my opinion. I have friends that own wineries and they all said this would NEVER happen with their club and it hasn’t.

I have NEVER had a problem with wine clubs...

I have tasted at far too many wineries to count and always look for several things to give a 5 star rating. 1: quality of the wine 2: ambience/feel of the tasting room/area 3: quality/engagement of the person who is pouring me the wine. Owen Roe had all of these. I knew their wines would be great having tasted several of them before and I love the industrial nature of their tasting room. you are where the magic is happening in all of those barrels. However the best part of my visit was Ashley. She not only was fully versed in the Owen Roe wines, she also had plenty of wine experience beyond Owen Roe and could bring that wealth of knowledge to the conversation. She wasn't giving each table her stock "pitch" but tailored the information that she shared to the individuals and the questions they asked. Owen Roe is lucky to have her on their staff. I'll be back to taste again and I hope Ashley is...