Browne Family Vineyards Tasting Room — Restaurant in Tacoma

Disappointing Experience – Will Not Return

I’ve been a long-time patron of Browne Wine Tasting Room in Tacoma WA, and it has been a tradition to celebrate special occasions here, but after this experience, I will never return. I made a reservation for 7 people on 2/20/25 for 5pm on 3/1/25 to celebrate a friend’s birthday, confirming the reservation again on 2/25/25, when the headcount changed to 6 and I changed the time from 5pm to 4pm to accommodate our plans later that evening. They assured me they would call to confirm the head count for the reservation closer to the date, but by 2pm on the day of, I had not received a call. When I called them, they confirmed the reservation for 6 people at 4pm.

When my first guest arrived at 4pm, they were told our reservation was at 5pm, not 4pm. Even though there were plenty of seats available at the bar for her to have a seat until I arrived, she was turned away and told she had to return at 5pm. She was treated rudely and condescendingly. I arrived shortly after, at 4:04pm, and asked to speak to the manager to understand what went wrong, but no manager was available. The staff seemed unprepared to address my concerns, and instead of apologizing, I was met with unnecessary attitude and blame.

The staff insisted that I must have received an email confirmation, even though no one had asked for my email. After further investigation, they admitted they never took my email address and, therefore, couldn’t have sent a confirmation. They then told me the soonest they could seat us was 4:45pm, but their tone was condescending and dismissive throughout the entire conversation.

As a result, we canceled our reservation and decided to take our business elsewhere. We ended up at Morso Bistro in Gig Harbor, where the service was amazing, and the atmosphere was perfect for our celebration. We were treated with respect, and they were incredibly accommodating.

Sadly, Browne Wine Tasting Room has lost our business for good. We will not be returning. The attitude and lack of professionalism were simply unacceptable. Had they apologized and treated us respectfully we would have considered coming back. Morso is now our new favorite spot, and we will be celebrating our future occasions...

On Christmas Eve my family and friends experienced such horrific customer service at Browne's Tacoma tasting room that all three households cancelled our memberships on the spot. We arrived for our annual tradition with a reservation for the fireplace Bitner Room that we made in mid-October for five only to discover they had seated a group of two in the space. We were so excited for this year's festive tradition because our server in October was able to help us book the fireplace seating area directly when we were unable to that far in advance online.

The server on Christmas Eve demonstrated zero problem solving skills and instead proceeded to lecture us on how to reserve the space in the future (don't worry, there won't be a next time), even telling me it was my responsibility to call in advance. She also made a disrespectful comment to our table that "it was Christmas Eve and she wasn't going to ruin it" for the two people already sitting at the fireplace, implying it was okay for her to ruin our Christmas Eve despite having a reservation since October.

We didn't expect the server to remove the other two guests in the fireplace area despite having been told numerous times on our visits that the fireplace is ONLY for groups of 4 or more, but we did expect the staff to provide alternative solutions. For example, they could have offered for us to come back at a later time in the day for the fireplace or moved us to it after the 2 guests finished their tasting as they had already started their flights. There were many opportunities to course correct the mistake made by Browne but instead the staff chose not to honor our reservation as booked and exhibited absolute abandonment of responsibility for the mistake directly made by the tasting room. Our group was truly offended and more upset by the treatment from staff than the actual seating placement.

The dismissive uninterested staff behavior on Christmas Eve was bewildering and not the high bar of customer service we thought Browne stood for. Our family annual tradition will move elsewhere where our business is welcome and we can trust we won't be framed as a problem that was actually made by the...

Our group of 4 went here for a wine tasting and we loved it! We managed to book a weekend reservation just one day in advance, but I saw that they do accept walk-ins as long as there is room. They also have some outdoor tables available if you want to bring your dog as you do a wine tasting.

Wine tastings ranged from $20-$35. You can also order wine by the glass, beer, and snacks to go with your wine. We ordered the wine and chocolate tasting and a charcuterie board. We thought the charcuterie board was a bit small for the price, but it was all very tasty. The wine and chocolate tasting was also really good - the pairings were perfect.

A few other notes: The space is somewhat small, so if you're looking for a reservation for more than four people you may need to reserve a little further in advance. Service was really good. We were able to check in a little earlier than our reservation time with no issue and our server checked on us multiple times while we were there. Free parking is available all around, so no issues there.

Overall, I would recommend this place if you're looking for a cute, intimate place to go...