Flooring for Winery Tasting Rooms – Marrying Style and Durability

By Kendall Youngworth, Tennant Coatings

Winery tasting rooms can range from an area in an upscale urban restaurant to a rustic barrel room in a country setting, overlooking vineyards, or other unique environments.

While the quality of the wines produced is, of course, paramount in terms of developing a following and increasing profits, the cachet of a brand—and the ambiance of the tasting room—can be critical aspects of on-the-ground marketing. Competition in the wine industry can be fierce and customer expectations high. Whether the format is a casual flight brought to the table for guests to try, or a curated collection presented by private appointment with your sommelier, in order to appeal to your targeted clientele, the wine tasting experience should be fun, educational and distinctly memorable. A unique and inviting tasting room environment sets the scene for success.

Regardless of location or type of establishment, the color palette and overall design of your tasting room should reflect and enhance your brand, while providing the backdrop for a uniquely unforgettable occasion that can win over even the most discriminating connoisseur.

To achieve these goals, the interior of the tasting room should be clean, with lighting that allows sufficient visual distinction when comparing different wines, yet which also supports the designed ambiance. In other words, the space needs to be both appealing and highly functional. Having the right tasting room flooring system can go a long way toward meeting these demands.

Durability, Sanitation and Cleanliness

Flooring in winery tasting rooms can face a wide range of challenges, including:

• Spilled wine, which contains acids and sugars that can damage some types of floors
• Staining, especially from red wines
• Harsh cleaning chemicals
• Abrasion from high-volume foot traffic of guests, employees, delivery personnel and their hand carts
• For slab-on grade or below grade locations, potential concrete slab moisture vapor issues
• The risk of microbial growth

Fortunately, resinous floor systems comprised of epoxies and urethanes, are capable of withstanding these challenges. The many options available for this type of flooring includes installation of an integral cove base that can reduce the crevices around floor edges and corners where bacterial growth tends to occur, and simultaneously enable easier, more thorough cleaning. Surface textures can be used to create custom levels of skid resistance, providing the traction your employees and customers need to help minimize the risk of slip-and-fall accidents, especially in areas where spilled liquids are a common occurrence. Unlike floor treatments such as concrete “polishing”, which can require frequent waxing, polishing and/or buffing, epoxy and urethane floor systems are extremely low maintenance.

Color Palette, Design…and Safety

Epoxy and urethane floor coatings are available in a vast array of colors and blends that can be combined to accommodate nearly every design vision. The flooring can be applied so that a logo or wine label image, such as the winery’s name, can be is embedded in the flooring. There are a variety of resinous flooring systems that can help create a “dazzle and wow” effect. Some of the decorative options include:

• Elegant metallic powders: When a metallic pigment is added to an epoxy, the result is an iridescent finish that can bring a warm glow to even the darkest room. Applying the metallic pigment using different techniques creates unique designs which can result in a cloud-like appearance or round bubbles, and can even mimic beautiful marbling, when two or more metallic pigments are used.
• Unique multi-colored flakes: This type of flooring system consists of colored flakes randomly distributed throughout the floor. The flake itself can help provide traction for additional slip resistance, while covering imperfections and creating a unified level floor. Available in a myriad of solid colors and blended color options, decorative flake systems are perfect for creating a terrazzo-like look at a fraction of the price.
• Sophisticated colored quartz aggregate: This decorative system consists of ceramic coated colored quartz granules that are distributed throughout the floor. These too are available in solid and blended color options and can help provide additional traction for extra slip resistance.

Topcoat any of the designer flooring systems above with either a gloss or satin clear finish to attain the desired look, traction and high performance you require.

Versatile Flooring Systems for Winery Tasting Rooms

The versatility of epoxy and urethane floor coatings in meeting the many needs for durability and style, make these custom flooring systems award winning, blue ribbon contenders for winery tasting rooms.