Julie O.
Yelp
Round Barn was a great boutique winery on the Michigan Wine Trail, but in the last couple years they have completely changed their focus from wine and select spirits production to beer drinking on the lawn.
To start, you enter through a tent where you can purchase a tasting, an elite tasting, a wine consultation (which sounded like a high-pressure sales pitch) or simply pay a cover to enter. There are counters in the tent which look like checkouts, which is where you buy your entry. The first checkout is for a tasting only. That person can't sell you the you the upgraded tasting nor can they tell you the next start time. You have to go over to the next counter to find that out. We'd been to Round Barn before, and did not know it had changed so dramatically, so we opted for the testing. We were handed cards and proceeded to the first floor pouring area.
When we went to the pouring area, no one greeted us. The pourers were busy with other tasks. We took a look at the menu, which has wine names and residual sugar, and that is about it. No notes, no descriptions. I guess they assume you already know what types of wines you like. I asked the pourer a question and she said she had no idea about any of the wines because she didn't drink. So we picked our wines and spirits blindly, hoping that they matched up to what we expected from a Merlot, Can, Sangria, etc. The wines were poured and put in a tray and we headed outside. Outside is nice. Most people seem to be drinking beer and listening to some guy sing about his ding-a-ling (so weird). The lawn is family friendly.
The wines and spirits were all disappointing. Flat, bland, no flavor. Tequila was like water - not because it was smooth, but because it was flavorless.
If you want to sit on a lawn at a winery and buy a growler or mixed drink, you may have fun here. If you want to do an actual wine tasting or learn about wines in Michigan, keep going. There are many other, better stops just up the road.