The Champagne houses everyone has heard of sit within a few miles of each other in Reims and Épernay, and most of them will show you their cellars. That is the problem: a famous name is easy to book and easy to regret, if you spend ninety minutes in a crowd and taste two glasses. These eight visits give you the chalk cellars, the growers who make their own wine, and enough time to tell them apart.
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How we chose these Champagne houses to visit
There are around 370 Champagne houses and roughly 16,000 growers in the appellation, according to the Comité Champagne. Only a few dozen open their doors on a schedule a visitor can book from home. Three rules cut that list to eight.
A cellar or a winemaker, not just a bar. Every visit here either takes you underground, puts you in front of the family that makes the wine, or both. Pure tasting rooms made the list only when they pour something you can’t taste anywhere else.
Bookable online, with the conditions in writing. Duration, group size, languages and cancellation terms had to be stated on the listing, so the box under each visit tells you what you are actually buying.
A mix of the famous and the small. The big houses explain Champagne as a brand; the growers explain it as a farm. A good day in Champagne has some of each, so the list does too, from a Veuve Clicquot cellar visit to a one-hour tasting in a village most travelers drive past.
Reims: the grandes maisons and a growers’ club
Reims is where the big names keep their cellars, many of them dug into the crayères, chalk pits quarried since Roman times and later turned into miles of galleries. The Saint-Nicaise hill, home to several of these houses, is part of the UNESCO World Heritage listing of the Champagne hillsides, houses and cellars. The cellars stay at about 50°F all year, so bring a jacket even in July.
1. Veuve Clicquot and a Family-Run Winery, With Lunch
Why it’s on the list. It solves the hardest part of visiting Veuve Clicquot: getting a slot and getting there. The day starts with a guided visit of the house’s cellars in Reims, run by Veuve Clicquot’s own guides, then moves out to Hautvillers and the Marne vineyards for a lunch at a family estate and a second, much smaller cellar in the afternoon.
The contrast is the point: one of the most recognizable labels in the world in the morning, a family that presses its own grapes after lunch. The honest limit is in the fine print: if Veuve Clicquot has no slot on your date, the operator swaps in another prestigious house. If the yellow label is the reason you are going, ask before you book.
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2. Maison Mumm and Two Growers, With Lunch
Why it’s on the list. Same shape as the Veuve Clicquot day, run by the same local operator, but it ends at Mumm, the house with the red sash on the label, back in Reims at the end of the afternoon. Before that you visit the press house, tank room and cellar of a family grower, stop in the vineyards and Hautvillers, and have lunch at a second estate.
It is the cheaper of the two full days and the better pick if you want more grower Champagne than big-house Champagne: two of the three stops are small producers. The review count is still modest, and the same substitution clause applies to Mumm. Note the minimum of two travelers: a solo booking gets moved or refunded.
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3. Spécial Club Tasting at the Club Trésors de Champagne
Why it’s on the list. It is the one place in Reims where you can taste the work of many growers without driving anywhere. The Club Trésors de Champagne, founded in 1971, groups 25 artisan producers, and its Spécial Club vintage cuvées come in a squat, shouldered bottle and must be approved by a panel before they can carry the name.
The format is a seated masterclass: how to taste, how Champagne is made, how to read a label, then the wines. It fits a free hour between two cellar visits, or the evening you arrive by train. Pick the six-glass package if you want three Spécial Club wines side by side; the three-glass version gives you only one.
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Épernay and the Marne Valley
Épernay is smaller than Reims and built around one street. The Avenue de Champagne, also part of the UNESCO listing, lines up the mansions of Moët & Chandon, Perrier-Jouët and Pol Roger above miles of cellars. The vineyards start at the edge of town, which makes Épernay the better base if you want to see the slopes as well as the cellars.
4. Côte des Blancs Grower Tour From Épernay
Why it’s on the list. A half day that covers the three things people come to Épernay for: a drive down the Avenue de Champagne with commentary, the Chardonnay slopes of the Côte des Blancs, and Dom Pérignon’s grave in the church at Hautvillers. The cellar visit is at an independent family grower, with a tasting of their Grand Cru and Premier Cru wines.
It also adds something the other tours skip: a taste of ratafia, Fine de la Marne and Marc de Champagne, the region’s aperitif and brandies. You see the big houses from the outside only, so pair it with a booked visit on the Avenue if Moët is on your list. Three and a half hours leaves the rest of the day free.
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5. Champagne Harlin Cellars, Mareuil-le-Port
Why it’s on the list. The best value on this page, and a real house visit rather than a tour: the Harlin family walks you through their own cellar and winery, then pours three Champagnes and a ratafia from parcels around Mareuil-le-Port, Épernay and Tours-sur-Marne. The estate talks a lot about biodiversity in the vineyard, and the visit includes a look at the vines.
It is an hour, so it fits between two bigger visits. The catch is transport: Mareuil-le-Port is in the Marne valley west of Épernay, and nothing on the listing gets you there, so you need a car, a driver or a taxi. The rating is a notch below the others, with value for money scored lowest.
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Grower Champagne houses, at the source
A grower Champagne is made by the family that farms the grapes, marked RM (récoltant-manipulant) in small print on the label, where the big houses carry NM (négociant-manipulant) because they buy most of their fruit. Grower visits are shorter and less polished, and the person pouring is often the one who made the blend. They are also the visits that sell out last, so they fill the gaps around a big-house booking.
6. Champagne Caroline Dufour, Reims
Why it’s on the list. A grower tasting inside Reims, in the house’s own shop, which is rare: most growers are out in the villages. You choose how many cuvées you taste, starting with two, the Grande Réserve and a Blanc de Noirs, and going up to eight, including a rosé and an organic cuvée.
It is the easiest way to add a grower to a Reims day without a car. There is no cellar visit in this format, and no reviews yet, so treat it as a tasting, not a tour. The same house also runs a sabrage session and a Champagne lunch if you want to stay longer.
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7. Champagne V&G Dupont, Reuves
Why it’s on the list. The cheapest seat at a grower’s table on this page, and the only one that welcomes children with their own activities. You taste four cuvées from the estate and learn how grape varieties, blending and aging change what is in the glass, with a short quiz to test what stuck.
Reuves is a village well south of Épernay, beyond the Côte des Blancs, so this is for travelers driving south toward the Côte de Sézanne or the Aube, not for a Reims-based day. One review is too few to judge by; the price makes the risk small.
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8. Two Family Growers in an Afternoon, From Reims
Why it’s on the list. The most-reviewed Champagne visit we found around Reims, by a wide margin, and the simplest way to see two grower cellars without renting a car. You leave Reims at 2 p.m., stop in the vineyards and at Hautvillers, and taste three Champagnes at each of two family producers.
Book it for the afternoon after a morning cellar visit in town: together they make a full day of big house and small grower with the driving done for you. It needs two travelers to run, and there is no lunch, so eat before you go.
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The famous Champagne houses you book directly
Several of the best-known names don’t sell their visits through booking platforms at all: you book on the house’s own website. That includes Moët & Chandon on the Avenue de Champagne in Épernay, and in Reims Ruinart, founded in 1729 and the oldest house still trading, Taittinger, whose cellars run under the ruins of the Saint-Nicaise abbey, and Pommery, with its chalk pits and contemporary art.
These visits are timed, run in several languages and often sell out on weekends from spring to the harvest, so book them first and build the rest of the day around the slot. They are not on the list above because there is nothing for us to link to, not because they aren’t worth it.
Booking, timing and getting between houses
How many in a day. Two cellar visits and a grower is a full day; three big houses back to back is too many, because each one tells the same story of riddling and disgorging. Mix a big house in the morning with a grower in the afternoon.
Reims or Épernay. Reims is about 45 minutes from Paris by high-speed train and has the most houses within walking distance. Épernay is closer to the vineyards. The two towns are roughly half an hour apart by car or local train.
Who drives. France’s limit is 0.5 grams of alcohol per liter of blood, and a Champagne day adds up quickly. In town, walk between houses; for the villages, book a tour with transport or nominate a driver who spits. Our guide to renting a car for a wine trip covers the rules country by country.
When. Cellars are open all year and stay cool whatever the weather. The harvest, usually late August into September, is the most beautiful time in the vineyards and the busiest in the cellars; our wine harvest season guide explains how to plan around it.
Prices here are per person unless stated. GetYourGuide converts into your own currency at checkout; Winedering shows prices in euros. Prices are indicative and set by our booking partners.
Where this fits in a Champagne trip
A day of Champagne houses is the core of any trip here, but the region is bigger than two towns. Our Champagne region travel guide covers the five wine areas, from the Montagne de Reims to the Côte des Bar, and when each is worth the drive.
If you are staying more than a night, sleep where the cellars are. Our guide to hotels in Épernay and Reims picks eight places to stay, from the Avenue de Champagne to a spa above the vineyards, so the first visit of the morning is a short walk away.
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Staying in Champagne for more than just today? A rental car makes it easy to reach the growers in the villages at your own pace.
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