Lodi Wine & Visitor Center

Don’t bother.
Sure: the Visitor Center will be helpful with ideas and recommendations for where to visit — but so will the wineries. More importantly: the wineries will waive the tasting fee when you buy something. Not so the Visitor Center. Lodi has plenty of good wineries that offer tastings at decent prices — don’t bother tasting here.
If they gave some rebate for buying bottles here, I’d be happy to up the rating. Until that happens, pick up some maps if you want, ask some questions. But save your tastings for the actual wineries.

The Center is our starting point on a road to discovery. By that, I’m referring to Lodi’s pretty unknown status as the largest wine making region in California. It’s rough around the edges, it’s informal and friendly, it’s not prettified. We definitely get the sense that this is what Napa and Sonoma used to be before they were overrun by fake chateaux, wine snobs, and tourists.
The folks at the Center provide you with maps and guidance on wineries you might want to visit. The tastings are based on wines grown in the area. Go with their recommendations. I recommend the wine club because it samples the best wines, chosen by a committee, from different wineries, ensuring that you’re not limited to one vintner.
Some of the poorer Unilocal reviews make no sense and I’ll call them out: The guy who never tasted any wine at the Center but decided they had a poor selection. The other guy who thought the area wasn’t pretty enough because it lacks the fake Napa-​style buildings.
Keep in mind that you will be among the first generation to appreciate Lodi’s wine, small town before property values soar, and the wonderful setting near the Sacramento delta.

Nice place to start your wine tasting excursion in Lodi. Lots to choose from, and many friendly, knowledgable people to help.

Love this place, our second time here and we enjoy both times. The lady who helped us was very nice and helpful.

Wanted to meet up with some girlfriends who live in the central valley, so we decided to do some wine tasting in Lodi. The visitor center was recommended as a good meeting place to start our day. It was hands down our best experience during the whole day!
We arrived before they opened so we were able to belly up to the vast bar and get to tasting right away. The gentleman pouring for us was very knowledgeable not only about the wines he was pouring for us, but for the other wineries in the area. He gave us quite a few suggestions of places we might want to visit during our day. His suggestions were not only for the wines, but for the fun kitschy things at the wineries. Like old oak bars that had been shipped from old brothels back east to pipe organs. Random fun things to check out while sipping wines. Who knew!
He knew that two of the girls with our group had never been wine tasting so he felt it was his personal mission to find ones that they’d like. It was very nice to be treated like we were the only people in the place.
Highly recommend starting here so that you can kick off your day and be shipped off to some great wineries on the very extensive wine map!

For my birthday my wife brought me here as a surprise. We were staying at the Hotel for the night and stopped by here for starters. Jori was absolutely great at describing the history, taste, food pairing. Ed who I found out later was her trainer was a joy. His passion for making our experience great was amazing. You should def show appreciation for these two fun people

Mediocre selection of wine for tasting. I didn’t even do a tasting. If I ever do a tasting again in Lodi I probably won’t stop here. But’s it’s a clean, nice facility. And they do have information tourists would find useful.

The short: Hidden in the Wine & Roses hotel, restaurant, and spa is a place where you can not only have a wine tasting, but get info and suggestions for local wineries to check out.
The long: I had some company coming into town for a few days and they originally wanted to go to Napa/​Sonoma to see some wineries and wine taste. Thing is they didn’t all drink wine and they really didn’t want to spend that kind of money. So being that I had learned Lodi had a ton of wineries, but had only recently moved to town myself I needed to find a place to get some info. I came in here and was really surprised by the amount of information that was available for me. the staff asked me what types of wine people drank and when we wanted to go then offered up a few recommendations. I had a wine tasting while I looked around at the wines and items for sale and although it was good I was a little disappointed in the experience. The woman who was pouring the wines and answering questions about it was literally telling me what the label said. She even admitted she didn’t drink wine and didn’t know much about it. Hold up didn’t you just tell me when you pored a glass it was your favorite of all? At that point I pretty much disregarded everything that came out of her mouth.
What works: Friendly staff, a good selection of wines for sale, and good source of info
What to improve: Have some staff that actually knows about wine and not just people who regurgitate the description on the bottle.

I visited the Lodi Wine & Visitor Center a year ago during a one-​day exploration of the general Lodi area. I encountered some of the nicest, most helpful, most courteous people at the Visitor Center.
First, I did a tasting. No, not all of the wines were to my liking, but that’s what a tasting is all about, to sample wines one hasn’t had before, and determine if anything is worth purchasing.
Second, they advised me regarding an easy route to visit a number of wineries prior to my having to head to Sacramento. VERY helpful!
Third, I had been doing some tasting in other parts of California, and had a partial case assembled. I inquired about shipping the case to my then-​home in Chicago, and they advised me that they could arrange that if I purchased some of their wines to round-​out the case. I bought some wine, brought in my case, and paid them to ship the wine to me. It made my life so much simpler and easier.
I am truly grateful to the Lodi Wine & Visitor Center for everything they did for me!

Great place to see some of what Lodi has to offer. Staff is friendly, knowledgable, and very helpful. Can’t wait to come back!

I first visited in March and was sufficiently impressed with the service and wine choices that I joined their wine club.
Returning this past week to pick up my shipment of four red wines, the same young lady remembered the prior visit and even recalled the conversation. Upon tasting all four wines, I was not disappointed. The two best were probably the Mettler Petite Sarah and the special Old Vine Zin produced for Zinfest by Van Ruiten Family Winery. I also purchased a 2009 Grady Old Vine Zin which is great value at $ 15.00
Some wine clubs become repetitive especially if the winery is fairly small. This club gives 4 different winery choices every quarter and one gets to taste wines that will never be seen at the local store.

Great wine selections! Ask about the wine club!

Absolutely the best! Knowlegeable, friendly staff, great selection of wines. If you have never been to Lodi wineries, definitely this should be your first stop.

I had high hopes for Lodi. I was on business in the area … and had just visited Sonoma for a day. I was not all ‘wined out’ but didn’t want to drive the 1.5 hours back to Napa/​Sonoma … so I googled a way I could score a fix before wine withdrawal set in.
Lodi in the past was an area where many of the Sonoma or Napa vineyards grew grapes that needed a warmer climate or they didn’t have space for. Not surprisingly, someone figured out that rather than just grow the grapes … they could set up tasting rooms and grab tourists and thus, Lodi wine country was born.
Personally, I think Lodi Wine Country has all the atmosphere of a child’s lemonaid stand near the highway. Basically, the wineries are just small, flat fields of grape vines with a highway intersecting them. It looks more like farming land than wine making. I will not return because of the lack of atmosphere … even the wineries are often just a bar style tasting room with a few outdoor tables next to a processing plant that looks factory-​esque.
The Lodi Wine and Visitor Center is the starting point for anyone wanting to visit the blah wineries here. There is a tasting room with a $ 5 fee which features some of the local wines. The tasting room/​store seems to be the only way to get information about the area. I stopped in expecting to find a kiosk manned by a friendly information person.
Instead, I was told to go to the tasting bar if I wanted information. There was one lady working the tasting bar … there were lots of tourists doing tastings. I felt awkward having to go up and interupt their tastings to ask a question. I wanted to know which were the most picturesque wineries to visit and have a few glasses of wine at.
After having to rephrase my question several times because she didn’t understand what I meant by picturesque (I guess when all of the wineries in Lodi are next to a highway … it could be a confusing question) she pointed out a few of the most popular wineries and went back to pouring the wines for tastings.
Technically, I wouldn’t call this a visitor center due to the lack of a person to answer questions. I would call this the ‘Lodi Wine Tasting Center’. They have a small table with free maps and a few brochures but mostly this is a tasting room and store.
I would not come back to Lodi … its just highway stands. Not traditional wineries. If you want to taste and buy local wines, this is a good spot for you but really its just like any other wine store with tastings in CA. Not a visitor’s center.

The staff was very informative, great place tho start your tours.

This is a great place to start your wine tasting day in Lodi. The staff is very knowledgeable and friendly, and in addition to having maps and directions to all the wineries, they can point you to tasting rooms that have the varietals you like the best. The Visitor Center also offers tastings themselves, which can be particularly handy on mid-​week days when some winery tasting rooms aren’t open. You get four tastings for $ 5 (free if you stay at Wine And Roses —
) from a rotating list of eight to 10 wines.
Overall, I wasn’t that impressed with the wines the Visitor Center offered the day we were there; maybe two out of eight were wines I liked. But since they’re drawing from nearly 90 wineries in the area, there’s bound to be a range of quality, and some days will be better than others.

So, who goes to Lodi for a holiday? Your looking at her. Honestly, there are some nice wineries in the area that Mr. B had missed from last trip. That was totally unsettling for him. God forbid he had overlooked/​missed a few good ones.
So our B&B host suggested we start with the Visitor Center. That way, he could pick and choose which, if not all of the 500 wineries and 80 tasting rooms, he wanted to visit. The Visitor Center is a nice place to start, newish, where you can taste, see, and buy many of the local wines. What impressed me the most, non drinker that I am, and other than it’s obvious architectural attractiveness, was the impressive and beautiful display of unique wine labels representing this appellation, some extremely eye catching. It is like visiting an art gallery.
Wine tasting is $ 5. You can find it right next to the exclusive Wine and Roses Hotel/​Resort.
For those who remember the Creedence Clearwater lyrics referring to Lodi, thank god it has changed.
Guess we’ll be back. Mr. B missed some more. «Oh, Lord, stuck in Lodi again.»

It was worth the stop to get the detailed brochure of all the wineries in the area. Your experience will differ depending on who your host is. The gentleman that handled my pours was friendly enough.
I didn’t care for the «$ 5 for 4 tastes of your choice» approach. I felt like I was blindly taking a stab in the dark for something I would like. I love a good zin but fell far short of falling in love with anything I tried here.

Started our Lodi tour at the Visitors Center with the $ 5 wine tasting by Ed, who still has a New York accent, even after 35+ years in CA. Very friendly and knowledgeable about the wines and vineyards in the area. Since Lodi tends to be a weekend-​winery kinda area, we were very glad to start here on a Monday to taste (and ultimately purchase) a couple bottles of wine.
My only suggestion: When discussing which wineries to visit, be VERY clear about your intent. Do you want to experience a winery’s atmosphere, buildings, grounds, etc. or are you looking to taste some of the region’s best wines? Trust me… you’ll get different lists and recommendations.

A great place to start touring Lodi wine country. The visitor center staff were very friendly, knowledgable and pleasant. They offered a free tour that walks in their garden which grew flowers and a few varieties of grapevines. It was a good place to see how different types of grapes differ from each other side by side and what were some of the agricultural considerations when planting grapevines. I’ve never learned anything like this in any of the Napa wineries.
Inside the visitor center, guests can also taste wines and make purchases. So if you are in a hurry, this is a one stop shop and they do carry good stuff. We bought 2 bottles from them before we even set our foot onto any wineries.