Private Family Producer Champagne Tour: Firsthand Review of Aÿ Champagne Experience

• Tour: Connoisseurs Experience, half day, private, afternoon
• Operator: Aÿ Champagne Experience, founded by Isabelle in 2018
• Length: about 3.5 hours, roughly 1:30 to 5 pm
• What we tasted: 9 Champagnes across two independent family producers, plus 3 local spirits
• Cost: around $340 per person from Epernay
• Pickup: Epernay or Reims, hotel door to hotel door
• Best for: people who care about what is in the glass more than whose name is on the label

Isabelle grew up in Aÿ, a Grand Cru village about 25 minutes from Reims, and holds a WSET Level 2 wine certification. She guides in English and translates at the producers when needed, so no French required.

That combination is the whole pitch: someone who knows the technical side and also knows which family down the road still presses grapes the old way.

A big house tour is a well-produced brand experience. It is polished, the cellars are impressive, and you will learn the history. What you will not do is have an unscripted conversation with anyone who actually made the wine.

A private family producer tour is the opposite trade. No script, no marble, no gift shop at the end. Just a few hours in working cellars with people whose families have farmed the same slopes for six generations.

We wanted the second thing. If you want the first thing, that is a completely legitimate choice, and I loved our day at Ruinart too!

There is a shorthand for that difference, and it is printed on every bottle. A two-letter code in tiny print near the bottom of the label tells you who actually grew the grapes.

• RM, récoltant-manipulant

Farms their own vines, makes Champagne only from their own fruit. This is what people mean by grower Champagne.

Joseph Desruets, our first stop, is an RM working about two hectares.

• NM, négociant-manipulant

Can also buy grapes from other growers. Every famous name is an NM: Ruinart, Veuve Clicquot, Taittinger, Moët.

So is Jean Milan, our second stop, even though the family has farmed its own Grand Cru vines in Oger since 1864.

That is the part that surprised me. NM does not mean big. Plenty of small family estates register NM so they can buy a little extra fruit when demand outruns their own vines.

The code does tell you something real about your glass. A grower’s Champagne reflects one family’s parcels and shifts from year to year. A house blend is built to taste the same every time, which is a completely different skill.

That is exactly why the Hebrart caught me off guard in Virginia.

What the letters cannot tell you is whether the wine is good. There are dull RMs and superb NMs. Use the code to know what you are drinking, not to rank it.

10:30 am: Leclerc Briant

Since we were already staying at the wine hotel, we booked a tour and tasting at Leclerc Briant ourselves for that morning, completely separate from the Aÿ tour.

We happened to be there during harvest, which is the one time of year the whole region is actively working.

Staff were hauling crates of grapes in the entire time we were there, and the energy was completely different from what a normal tour day would have felt like. Everything was in motion.

Harvest is also the hardest window to book, since some producers stop taking visitors altogether. If you can get in, it is worth planning around.

That is the practical reason we chose the afternoon half day rather than the full day. If you are staying in Epernay, you can fill the morning yourself and skip paying for a full day.

Lunch was a quick sandwich and a salad, which turned out to be a smart move for reasons that become clear around tasting number six.

More options in my where to stay in Champagne guide if you are still in the planning phase.

1:30 pm: Pickup in the Beach Buggy

Not a coach. Not a minivan. A red electric E-Mehari, which is essentially an open-sided French beach buggy. Isabelle was so friendly right from the start, and we chatted back and forth the entire drive.

I mention this because it tells you what kind of day it is going to be before anyone pours anything.

One honest caveat. The E-Mehari is small and basic. We thought that was half the fun, but it takes a bit of effort to climb in and out of.

If that would be a problem for you or whoever you are traveling with, ask when you book. Isabelle has a more comfortable car she can bring instead.

1:45 pm: The Church Where Dom Pérignon Is Buried

First stop is Saint-Sindulphe Church in Hautvillers, where the tombstone of Dom Pierre Pérignon sits inside.

Worth knowing: the church is open to the public year round and free to enter, so you do not need a tour to see it.

Having Isabelle there to walk us through why this monk mattered is what turned it into more than a quick look at a tombstone.

Dom Ruinart is also buried in the same church, which I did not realize until after we got home. We also toured the Ruinart cellars in Reims on this trip, so the two ended up connected without us planning it.

2:00 pm: The Viewpoint

A short stop at a panoramic overlook above the vineyards, and we got lucky with the weather.

This is YOUR photo.

Rows of vines running down the hillside, the valley opening up behind them, and no crowd to work around. If you have been waiting for the shot that actually looks like Champagne, have your camera ready for this one.

2:20 pm: Joseph Desruets

Champagne Joseph Desruets has been in the same family in Hautvillers since 1888, and they still press their grapes in the wooden press their ancestors used. It is called the Darcq-Flamain and holds 4,000 kilos.

Champagne’s own producer directory calls it the oldest Champagne press still in operation.

It is not behind glass and it is not a museum piece. It sits right there in the room with you, and it still gets used every harvest. They farm a bit over two hectares and have been organic since 2020.

We tasted three Premier Cru Champagnes: Cuvée Soleil de Mai, Cuvée Coeur de Pinots, and Cuvée Sybarite.

The Coeur de Pinots was our favorite. Pear and honey first, then a toasty brioche note underneath, which is what you get when a wine spends years aging on its spent yeast.

3:30 pm: The Surprise Drink

It is made from the juice of the third or fourth press, then fortified with brandy. People drink it as an apéritif or after dinner. Very fun to try.

We also tried Marc de Champagne, made by pressing the skins and seeds and aging the result in barrels, and Fine de la Marne, aged specifically in barrels along the Marne River.

Fair warning: these are spirits, and they land differently than Champagne does. Pace yourself here.

4:00 pm: Jean Milan

Jean Milan has been in the same family since 1864, and Jean-Charles Milan is the fifth generation to run it. They vineyards are in Oger, which is one of Champagne’s 17 Grand Cru villages.

Nnearly every vine in it is Chardonnay, planted on chalk. So everything Milan makes is blanc de blancs, meaning Champagne made only from white grapes (with the exception of their rosé).

They still pick by hand and press in their old presses, which is slower and lets them be pickier about what goes in.

The friendly staff walked us through six of their Champagnes. The Cuvée Symphorine was the standout, green apple and citrus with a chalky mineral edge running underneath.

5:00 pm: Dropoff + Dinner

Isabelle dropped us back at the hotel around 5 pm.

We had dinner booked at L’OBEN for 7:30, and that gap turned out to be exactly right. Time to relax, freshen up, and yes, take a nap, before walking over.

That is the thing I love about Epernay. You can walk to dinner from your wine hotel.

My husband had the farmhouse chicken with sautéed potatoes and I had French beef chuck, slow cooked in red wine. Both were excellent.

And of course we ordered more Champagne! We went with a bottle from Lahaye-Berthelot, a family estate five generations in, farming about three hectares in the hills just south of town.

Worth knowing before you plan around it: they are closed Tuesday and Wednesday, evening service is a single 7:30 seating, and it books up. Reserve ahead.

It is genuinely expensive.

Around $320 a person for three and a half hours is more than a big house cellar tour costs, by a lot. You are paying for private, for transport, and for access to small producers who normally need an appointment. Worth it for us. Not obviously worth it for everyone.

Nine tastings plus three spirits is more than it sounds like on paper.

Leave yourself a couple of hours between the drop-off and any dinner reservation. We had two and a half and used every minute of it.

The Connoisseurs half day is private only, with a two person minimum.

There is no cheaper group version of this format, so a couple carries the whole cost between them.

This is not a Reims tour.

It is a regional tour that will collect you from Reims or Epernay. If you pictured walking out of your hotel to a cellar door, that is a big house day, not this.

You will want to buy bottles.

Budget for it, and check what your country lets you bring home before you fall in love with something.

Book it if: you care more about what is in the glass than whose name is on the label, you have already done a famous house somewhere in the world and found it a bit corporate, or you want a conversation rather than a presentation.

Skip it if: the person you are traveling with is coming along to be nice. Three and a half hours of tasting-focused touring is a lot to ask of someone who is not that into wine. A big house cellar tour is the friendlier option, shorter and more visual, and nobody will feel dragged along.

Skip it also if this is your only day in Champagne and you have never seen the chalk cellars. Do a house first. Come back for the small producers.

Two options with distinct differences:

→   Connoisseurs Experience, half day

Private only, morning or afternoon. Two independent growers, around 3.5 hours. This is what we did. Roughly $340 per person from Epernay.

→   Gold Experience, full day

Private, around 7 to 8 hours. Same two-grower structure plus lunch with a bottle of Champagne, more tastings, and a run down the Avenue de Champagne in Epernay. Roughly $620 per person from Epernay.

Pickup point changes the price.

Collection from Reims costs noticeably more than collection from Epernay on the same tour, because it is a longer drive each way.

We stayed in Epernay and loved it, and it happens to be the cheaper pickup. If you are torn between the two towns, I break it down in Epernay or Reims: 6 factors to help you decide.

The half day is the right call if you have something else planned that morning. The full day is the right call if this is your one Champagne day and you want lunch handled.

We booked through Viator and it was easy: instant confirmation, and free cancellation if your plans shift.

What stuck with me was not the famous name.

It was a village nobody has heard of, a press that has been working since 1888, and somebody explaining why this particular hillside makes wine that tastes like this and nothing else.

If that sounds like your kind of afternoon, book the grower tour. If the grand cellars are calling you instead, book a house. Both are fantastic days.

À votre santé.

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