Naples Winter Wine Festival Honored as “Best Wine Festival”

Naples Winter Wine Festival Honored as “Best Wine Festival” (2025) in the United States in Latest USA Today 10 Best Readers’ Choice Award

The Naples Children & Education Foundation (NCEF), the founding organization of the Naples Winter Wine Festival (NWWF), is proud to announce that USA Today readers across the country have voted the NWWF as the country’s “Best Wine Festival” for 2025, recognizing the Festival with USA Today’s 10Best Readers’ Choice Award.

With three days of activities, the NWWF showcases dozens of award-winning chefs and renowned vintners who generously donate their time and talents at intimate wine dinners across Naples, plus an incredible live auction with one-of-a-kind auction lots. The 2025 NWWF raised a record of over $34 million toward NCEF’s mission of transforming the lives of children in need.

“We are just really thrilled and honored to be recognized as the best wine festival in the United States for 2025, which coincided with our 25th anniversary celebration,” said Naples Children & Education Foundation CEO Maria Jimenez-Lara. “We are also deeply grateful to our incredible volunteers, partners, vintners, chefs, supporters and guests who made this recognition possible.”

Since its inaugural event in 2001, the NWWF has raised more than $336 million, making a profound and sustaining difference in the lives of the most vulnerable children in Collier County.

Excitement is already building for the 26th annual Naples Winter Wine Festival from January 30, 2026 through February 1, 2026 at The Ritz-Carlton Naples, Tiburón. This year’s theme “Picture This” is a call to imagine and to believe in what is possible when compassion meets action. The theme challenges Festival supporters, vintners, chefs and donors to picture the impact their generosity can have in creating a world of endless futures for children in our community.

Already announced are the 2026 Honored Vintners Shahpar and Darioush Khaledi, founders of the acclaimed Napa Valley winery Darioush, and Chef de Cuisine Dustin Valette, the Chef-Owner of Valette and The Matheson in Healdsburg, California, and Owner of Valette Wines. Additional celebrity chefs, acclaimed vintners and featured sommeliers will be announced later this summer.

Ticket packages for the Naples Winter Wine Festival are sold for the entire weekend and start at $17,500 per couple for a Double Magnum package and $40,000 for two couples to experience a Jeroboam package. For more information, please visit: napleswinefestival.com/about-the-festival.

About Naples Winter Wine Festival

The Naples Winter Wine Festival (NWWF), one of the world’s most prestigious charity wine auctions, offers a weekend of unforgettable memories. Guests enjoy world-class food and wine during intimate dinners in elegant, private homes and other landmark settings throughout Naples and are invited to bid on once-in-a-lifetime travel and wine experiences during an electrifying live auction. Since its inaugural event in 2001, the NWWF has raised more than $336 million, making a profound difference in the lives of hundreds of thousands of children in Collier County.

About Naples Children & Education Foundation

The Naples Children & Education Foundation (NCEF), the founding organization of the Naples Winter Wine Festival, is improving the educational, emotional and health outcomes of underprivileged and at-risk children. Through its annual grants and strategic initiatives, NCEF has impacted close to 90 of the most effective nonprofits in the local community, providing 385,000 children with the services and resources they need to excel. NCEF’s unique approach, which emphasizes collaboration between organizations and bridges public and private resources, has become a blueprint for how to transform a community, one issue at a time.

For additional information on the Naples Children & Education Foundation or the Naples Winter
Wine Festival, contact Lisa Juliano at lisa@napleswinefestival.com or 239-514-2239.