Insurance solutions for wineries with hospitality services

Wineries that offer hospitality services like restaurants, tasting rooms, or event spaces face unique challenges that set them apart from other businesses. Beyond crafting exceptional wines, these establishments must also manage risks associated with hosting guests, running events, and safeguarding their physical facilities.

Securing the right insurance coverage is essential for protecting your operations, mitigating risks, and ensuring long-term success.

Risks wineries with hospitality offerings face

Operating a winery with hospitality services means taking on more than just traditional vineyard risks. Key challenges include:

• Liability exposure: Serving wine on-site increases the potential for incidents such as slip-and-fall accidents or alcohol-related liabilities. Hosting private events or tastings may lead to disputes or claims if guests are injured or property is damaged. Example claim: A guest leaves your tasting room intoxicated and is involved in an accident — liquor liability insurance can help cover legal costs and damages.
• Property damage: Tasting rooms, restaurants, and event spaces require significant investment in decor, fixtures, equipment, and inventory. Fires, vandalism, flooding, or theft could result in expensive losses. Wine storage areas add another layer of complexity, as temperature fluctuations or equipment failure in climate control systems can damage valuable inventory.
• Employee injury: Your employees are some of your most valuable assets, and workplace injuries can be among the costliest exposures to your business. Insuring this risk is vital to protecting your winery and your team.
• Business interruption: Natural disasters, equipment malfunctions, or unforeseen events — like a fire in a restaurant kitchen — could temporarily shutter operations and impact revenue. Interruptions could extend beyond the physical damage, especially if reputational impacts deter future guests from visiting.

These risks highlight why general coverage is not enough. Wineries with hospitality components need specialized insurance tailored to their operational needs.

Schedule a custom coverage review for your winery today.

Insurance essentials for wineries with hospitality services

To address these unique challenges, wineries should consider the following key insurance options:

• General liability insurance: Protects the winery from third-party claims of bodily injury, property damage, or personal injury.
• Liquor liability insurance: Addresses risks specifically related to serving alcohol, such as claims arising from over-serving guests who later cause harm. For example, a winery host overserves a guest who then causes bodily injury or property damage off-site — liquor liability covers associated legal fees and settlements.
• Property insurance: Safeguards your buildings, equipment, and inventory against risks like fire, theft, or natural disasters.
• Business interruption insurance: Covers net income and ongoing operating expenses if your business is temporarily shut down due to a covered event.
• Event insurance: Provides coverage against risks associated with hosting weddings, private tastings, or large-scale events on your property. For example, if severe weather forces a wedding to be canceled, event insurance can cover lost income or rescheduling costs.
• Workers’ compensation insurance: Coverage for claims arising from work-related injuries to employees. This is one of the most controllable aspects of your insurance program — with the right strategies, you can reduce both the frequency and severity of claims, improving overall costs and outcomes.

Designing your hospitality coverage

Running a winery with hospitality offerings is rewarding, yet complex. The right insurance coverage enables you to focus on delivering incredible experiences to your guests without worrying about unexpected disruptions or liabilities.

Partnering with a specialty insurance broker who understands the unique risks of the wine industry and your hospitality operations ensures peace of mind. We handle the complexities of policy management, so you can focus on what you do best.

Our expert team of winery insurance specialists will:

1. Assess your specific needs: A comprehensive audit of your operations will identify potential exposures, from vineyard activities to guest-facing services like event hosting or on-site dining.
2. Bundle policies where possible: Bundling essential coverages like property, liability, and business interruption insurance into a single policy to simplify management and reduce costs.
3. Review policy limits and exclusions: A broker ensures policy limits are sufficient to cover the replacement cost of all physical assets and reviews exclusions carefully to avoid surprises at claim time.
4. Reassess coverage regularly: Growing operations or new services — such as live entertainment or expanding event hosting — may require additional coverage.