Andy L.
Yelp
A wonderful example of "a beautiful building does not necessarily mean a beautiful experience".
7 Vines is one of those businesses that really can't decide on who they want to be. Do I want to be a winery? Do I want to be an event center? Do I want to be open to the public? Do I want to be private-only? Do I want people to actually buy our wines or do I want to try to apply Napa prices to Minnesota markets? It seems that management changes their mind on these questions on a weekly basis.
I've been to 7 Vines many times since they've been in operation, and every single time its a different experience. When they first opened, it was an amazing experience! The tasting room actually did tastings! The prices were in line with market prices. Great ambiance, great interaction with the hosts, great overall experience. The next time I visited, was told they were no longer doing tastings, only "flights". Okay. I guess I'll do flights, but why call it a 'tasting room' if you're not doing tastings? Well, they changed the name to "Wine Bar" shortly after I brought this up.
Okay fast forward a few years, hours are becoming erratic, inconsistent. You can't just "swing by" any longer for a glass of wine, you need to do a triangulation of their website calendar, Facebook posts, and a little glimmer of hope to get a slim peek at if they'll be open to the public or not that day. Okay, I guess I can work with this, but its a hit or a miss. Prices continue to increase. A single glass of Marquette is going for $10-$15, and got to the point to where we could no longer afford to buy a bottle on site since they were charging $45+ per bottle! Napa prices don't work in Minnesota, so they've effectively priced me out of buying their product which is truly unfortunate.
Fast forward to today, they are no longer a winery with an event center, they are an event center that happens to also have a winery. Good luck getting in unless you're paying them to host an event, they are most always closed to the public. Can't visit them any longer since they're never open, can't buy any of their wines since they're so exorbitant. Don't get me wrong, the wines are good, they're just not THAT good to warrant taking out a small loan for a bottle.
Maybe someday they'll return to actually being a public-friendly winery, but not holding my breath unfortunately. But the great news is there are plenty of other wineries in the area that will gladly host you!