Specialties
My background spans ten years in the hospitality business, where I owned and managed two wine tour companies, and twenty years in healthcare sales management and development, where I developed three market leaders.
It's a short step from Cardiology to Red Wine, lol! So my lifelong passion for wine has led me to the wine industry, where I now give private wine excursions.
As a result, I have three certifications:
WSET Level III advanced
FWS (French Wine Scholar)
Level 1 Sommelier
All of this is so that I can create palate-specific wine tour experiences for my customers without seeming arrogant. This knowledge may be shared with clients to help them appreciate wine even more.
History
Established in 2016.
Don Ward is the owner of Taylor Tasting Tours. He has a passion for wine and has been in the wine tour business since 2009. Through his tours, he has gotten to know most of the winemakers of Washington's finest Boutique wineries. He recently sold Seattle's most popular public wine tour company in 2016 to start Taylor Tasting Tours which focuses on smaller Custom Private Escorted Tours targeted toward wine lovers who know something about wine or those who wish to learn about it, all while visiting some of Washington's finest Boutique wineries.
Taylor Tasting Tours offers wine tours, private wine tasting, distillery tours, and brewery tour. If you want to enjoy your wine with a view, Taylor Tasting Tours knows just what to offer you. They have the expertise in wine and the owner is a "French Wine Scholar " and a Sommelier, as are most of his guides. They take the time to discuss your preferences like no one else and design your tour to suit your requests and palette.
Meet the Business Owner: Donald W.
The owner of Taylor Tasting Tours, Don Ward, developed a passion for wine just after college when his travels as a marketing rep for a major airline took him to France, Italy, Spain, etc. where he observed that the Europeans enjoyed wine with most meals as the norm. What a great way to live he thought.
Pursing his passion upon moving to Seattle, he started taking classes at NW Wine academy and still continues to take them. This is where he met and has hired his wine guides. They now offer fun and rich winery tour/wine tours, private wine tasting, distillery tours, brewery tour, and even wine tasting delivered to their customer's doorsteps.
Don has now received a level 1 sommelier certificate and been certified as a French Wine Scholar by the French Wine Society. According to him, "The more I know, the more I can assist my clients in finding the wines that they will truly enjoy." All with no pretentiousness. His goal is to provide the best wine tasting tours in Seattle, Washington.