Giessinger Winery

I love this place. Great wine, affordable, friendly staff, beautiful location.

As a forewarning this winery is those who have the pallet for sweet dessert wines. Personally I prefer dry reds/​whites, but that is not the reason for the 1 star.
Service is decent, there was a small crowd but was they were attentive enough to check back frequently. No complaints there. There were instances where they wouldn’t serve us a particular wine we had requested even though we were told at the beginning that we can choose any 8 out of the whole list. Their rationale, «Oh we would have to open a new bottle for that… let me give you another white instead…»
Wine…the wine… rarely can you find fine wine that can be stored over a decade. And if there was one it would have to be stored in a carefully monitored cellar. The wine we were served dated from 2005 all the way back to 1999. Please take careful note of the date of this review. The labels were smudged as if they were once wet and dried. Hardly legible even up close. The conditions of these bottles hardly point to a storage discipline worthy of serving a 16 year old wine. The taste… to each their own. However, every wine we were served tasted rancid and we did not finish the flight.
The final kicker was when we were served a 1999 bottle of wine. The server suggested we should grab a bottle as there was «only one bottle left». Left over bottle of rancid wine from a decade and a half ago for $ 29.99. No thank you.

Candy was an amazing bartender. Full of knowledge, and very personable! The Symphony & Winter Raspberry was excellent! My guy really enjoyed the Petite Syrah.
A wine tasting flight is $ 10 for 8. Candy is pretty generous, which was a nice change.
I wish our travels had taken us back through Fillmore today, because I planned on picking up a few whites on my way home rather than attempt traveling with them.
Definitely recommend dropping by. It’s not the most beautiful, or impressive winery I’ve been too, but it was worth the stop.

Despite the VERY mixed reviews on here about this place, I decided to stop in. So glad I did. I had a great experience here. Their wines are all single grape wines and are a bit different flavor profiles than other wineries of the same grapes. But overall, I found them to be quite good. Especially their dessert wines. The Grenache, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Petite Syrah were some of my favorites from memory. But the diamond in the rough was the Surrender Port. I’m not a dessert/​port guy, but this stuff was impressive I bought a bottle along with the Grenache.
Like I said the reviews for this place were very mixed and was not expecting greatness, but was pleasantly surprised. My wife and I do a lot of wine tasting in many regions throughout California. Maybe… even with all the tastings we’ve done, I’m not a snob enough to hate on this place like some others here.
If you’re looking for nice little get away in an area without any other wine, it’s definitely worth a stop in. Thanks Giessinger!

In a word: AVOID.
We stopped in today on a lark — biggest mistake of my wine drinking life.
Where to start??? OK: These guys are selling 2008 white wines (in 2015), and they are horrid.
Next, the reds: all with very odd tastes, most with tons of residual sugar (which any serious winemaker would turn into «sink wine», sending it down the sink rather than into a bottle), and no flavors remotely pleasurable to drink.
What was more egregious was that ALL of the bottles being used today — April 8 — had «3÷28» written on the back label in pen. I’m presuming this was the date each of the bottles was opened — and I can tell you, these all tasted like bottles which had been long opened and left in the sun.
Even though they hadn’t been. In fact, the lady went out of her way to say that their Barbera was «supposed to be served chilled from the refrigerator».
Indeed, one of them was so old that the sediment actually clogged the pour-​spout, and NOTHING CAME OUT!!! (Although, the shaking of the Chocolate ‘Port’ to get the chocolate flavor back into was probably the funniest thing I saw today.)
The bottom line is that this place has no business calling it’s liquids wine. They are swill. A reviewer in 2013 stated so, and in 2 years, they haven’t got any better.
Probably because, 2 years later, the Geissingers are likely selling the same stuff because they have so much excess, ancient inventory, they can’t give it away. But they’ll sell it for $ 25 or more a bottle to unsuspecting people.
Note also that these guys grow a grand total of ZERO grapes a year. They buy all their juice. My guess is that they’re buying stuff for maybe $ 10 a ton — which is basically to say that they are buying juice from people in Lodi, Santa Clara (huh? Isn’t that where Intel’s located???), Paso Robles, etc who are trying to DUMP their crap. I’m guessing this is junk that not even Two-​Buck-​Chuck would buy.
So don’t waste your time, and certainly not any money on this stuff. I am mad at myself for paying even the tasting fee. It is literally WRONG that the Geissingers can charge you anything in good faith for either the tasting or for what they’ve put into a bottle and try to pass off as wine. It’s not wine. It’s junk.
Oh, and yes — it’s truly bad form to not refund someone’s tasting fees when they buy a junk wine from you that you’re trying to unload on an uninformed public. They should be ashamed of this whole sham operation.

Serious ethical issues in serving beverages and not providing a working restroom even for your employees. Stay away on this principal alone.

Wine wine and more wine! So great to take the nice drive out here and relax. Stop at some fruit stands on the way and get a beautiful bottle of wine to complete the meal!

Nice patio area stationed outside of an old railroad with some period trains and equipment. Could be a great place for any train lover to enjoy some wine. The host was quite pleasant and enjoyable to talk to. Unfortunately when we visited the interior was not a comfortable place to stand chat and enjoy wine, the heat from the day just seemed to be so trapped. My girlfriend who tends to gravitate towards sweet wines enjoyed the flights much more than I, the wines were not my favorite but not everyone enjoys everything, if you in the area stop by and make the decision yourself.

We enjoyed a nice Sunday afternoon in Fillmore with a few friends. Giessinger Winery was one of our stops. We’ve been to over 50 wine-​tasting venues, and we would rank this at the bottom of our list.
A few wines were pretty good, and somewhat interesting. The winemaker makes some decent dessert blends. But for the most part, the wine was undrinkable. And these bottles MSRP for 29.99? Ridiculous.
If you are in Ventura County for wine tasting, you can skip this place. It is way off the beaten path anyway.

Full disclosure: I’m not a wine drinker – really more of a craft beer lover. That being said, I’ll give my review from that perspective and that alone. I really, really enjoy Giessinger in Fillmore.
I’m sorry I don’t remember her name but the lady normally there on Saturdays is wonderful. She’s very attentive, extremely friendly and makes you feel right at home.
They have a couple of tables and you can sit on the patio or the lawn, which I really enjoy. I go there quite often and bring my dog and she always brings water without having to ask – the lady, not my dog.
To fully expose my ignorance of wine, I order the «sweeter white» and she always seems to know what I’m talking about. They do have a couple of beers on hand but none that I’m particularly fond of so I get the «sweet one.»
I’m not going to compare this to other wineries and the quality of their wine verses a Napa or French – as mentioned, it’s not my goal. I’ll only say this. It’s a very friendly, relaxing place to go and they’re pet friendly. If you’re in the area, it’s well worth stopping in. Maybe you like the wine, maybe you don’t. But it’s a great place nonetheless.

the atmosphere is what should bring you here… imagine a great climate, wine tasting on a patio with a live musician taking requests. What more could you want???

Giessinger has long been one of our favorite wine tasting rooms. Discovered it first in Filmore many years ago and then found out they had a tasting room in Santa Barbara,. Great location… DO miss when the wine tasting included about 20 wines or so (seriously!) and at least half of them were dessert wines… now you only get 4 tastings, but still love the wines. Especially the dessert wines. Although the other wines are good, my husband and I think they should really concentrate on their dessert wines… they are aMazing! Forgiveness has always been our favorite…(have never tasted anything else like it Anywhere!), and the Port is amazing too.

Very nice wine steward. Knowledgeable and happy to explain the history. Not bad wine either!

This is a tough business and not every product can please the high likes of Robert Parker or Wine Spectator, but truly Giessinger Winery has undrinkable wine. This was very much grape juice which had turned bad and each variety seemed curiously similar to the others. Sorry to be so critical for those who have made such a great effort, but none of the few guests present even bothered to finish their flights. This was a great disappointment. The friendly & attentive staff definitely established a connection with the guests, but not enough to overcome the product.

How dare they call this wine! Swill comes to mind. Good grief! It’s unfortunate for the «winemaker» who we understand from the wine host, is an educator in physics at UCSB and also teaches wine making! Parents, you are paying for this. Stop! Although his intentions may be honorable, his wine is not. As we left the tasting room, (gratefully) and visited many wineries in our journey through the Ventura Wine Trail, other wine hosts were laughing, along with us, about the quality of Giessinger wines. Stay away. I know his heart may be in the right place. His palette is not.

Expect the idiosyncratic and quirky at Giessinger. Almost every varietal tasted there is not at all like the typical flavour profile of that in California or France or any other region for that matter. Having said that, the next rule of thumb for Giessinger is the French aphorism, «Chacun a son gout.» or To each his own (taste).
In a lot of ways, this winery is in its own alternate universe when it comes to the world of wine probably reflecting the values, tastes, & perception of taste by the wine owner/​winemaker. I do admire a person who can stick to his principles, and not be deflected by the opinions & tastes of others.
Interestingly, I went to a Pop-​Up restaurant by a chef, who is himself rather quirky in his culinary style. The chef was kind enough to post a menu with cooking technique & ingredients listed so that I was able to discern what wine might pair with the cuisine. I took my Saint Emilion from Giessinger which is an organic white wine & is made from «a rare French varietal».
Saint Emilion is in the French wine growing region of Bordeaux but produces only Merlot, Cabernet Franc, & Cabernet Sauvignon which are all red grape varietals and are not particularly rare. So is Saint Emilion by Giessinger made from white grapes outside St. Emilion but still in Bordeaux? Perhaps it is made from a Bordeaux white grape varietal such as Muscadelle, Ugni Blanc, Folle Blanche, Sauvignon Gris, or Colombard. Who knows?
Giessinger Winery or at least its owner/​winemaker is a mystery wrapped in a paradox, placed in a conundrum, locked into an enigma.
Quite a few of the sweet dessert wines and ports are infused with other fruit or chocolate flavours so this might also be a bit unKosher for the wine purist. 3– Unilocal stars when one is in a forgiving mood.

UGH… my husband stopped there to get me a bottle of wine, as a nice gift, on his way home from ventura… he got the sav blanc as that is my favorite… right off I noticed all the sediment and floaters in the bottom… ok, I can over look that… went to drink it, and was hit with a strong, weird taste, kind of like, as one poster noted, kerosene… don’t know what it was, but it was undrinkable… even husband said it was awful, and has a petroleum type taste… wow…no thanks, won’t be back…

Wow, just wow. It pains me to write a 1 star review for any winery, especially one that overall was very nice to me. But I cannot rate them any higher. I stopped in needing a wine made in Ventura or Malibu for a wine tasting event. I went here out of convenience because they were on my way to the get together.
The place was empty and the lone staff member was there to take me through the wines of the day. It’s $ 10 for a tasting, none of it refunded with purchase. We start off with a light white wine. Immediately I notice a problem. It tastes awful. I start to go through my mind thinking what I ate last and if it could be affecting my palate. Then we go through more white wines. All are terrible, some with notes of plastic, kerosine and even one with urine.
We move on to a ’02 chardonnay. It is a deep yellow color and this is quite old for an average chardonnay. The girl tells me this is because the grapes were left on the skins longer. Uh, no, that is not true. This is not a red wine. Such a dark color in a white is a clear sign of oxidation. Not something desirable. I find it interesting that another review noted this as well. Why are they still claiming this?
We move through the reds, nothing too terrible but nothing that was really good. The desert wines were very amateurish, one had chocolate sauce added to it. Wow.
I could not go to this get together empty handed so I bought a wine that was a blend of merlot and a white wine. It reminded me of Boone’s Strawberry Hill and I hoped I could pass this off as a fun wine for a warm spring day. At $ 25, it was seriously overpriced.
The get together involved some wine friends, including a winemaker. It was interesting to discuss this wine, we all had some good laughs when I told them things I had been told at Giessinger. We goofed around and added some petit sirah to the wine I bought, just to see if it helped but it did not. The wine I brought was the only one leftover, with about ¾ of the wine left in the bottle at the end of the night.
I see lots of reviews from first timers here. This is not wine tasting. If you are headed east, I highly recommend Pulchella Winery in Newhall. Headed west, hit Ojai Vineyards in Ojai or Four Brix in Ventura. These are real wineries.

Learned about this place due to the neighboring train and dinner show. Got to experience the wine selections at a decent rate. The wine tasting was a great choice for a fist timer. The hostess was very informative and after a few samples she was able to recommend a glass by the response you given her. All in all was very satisfied.

Very last stop on a week-​long trip, sort of a last minute decision to delay coming home.
The wine is almost all on the sweet end, with maybe the exception of the Grenache. That makes sense, seeing how their winemaker is known for dessert wines. If you are into the heavy reds and do not appreciate port, then Giessinger is probably not for you. But for someone who is into the sweeter side of wine then this is your place!
They have a rotation system for pouring, so each day is a little different. Our server was cheery and she gave us a small bonus pour, which I suppose is routine at most places. Their chocolate port was different. My goodness, it didn’t have the consistency of chocolate syrup but sure tasted like it. Not my style, personally, but interesting.
Eight bucks is a good deal for tasting rooms these days. Their inventory seemed to start at around $ 25.