Croatia is rich in indigenous grapevine varieties. However, only a small number of them is grown commercially. The obstacle to the revitalization of these varieties represents a high rate of virus infection, ie, the absence of healthy mother plants for the production of certified planting material. The varieties selected in this study were the indigenous Croatian varieties 'Bilan', 'Debit', 'Glavinuša', 'Ljutun', 'Mladenka', 'Plavac mali sivi' and 'Žumić'. All of the plant material was collected from the National Collection of Croatian indigenous varieties in the “Jazbina“ experimental station of the Faculty of Agriculture, University of Zagreb. The aim of this paper was to compare four plant material sampling terms (during the winter period and three samplings during vegetation), the origin of the meristem (shoot tip or bud) and the shoot tip size (1 mm or > 1 mm) in order to determine the „sampling model“ for further research on the elimination of viruses from indigenous Croatian grapevine varieties. Virological analysis showed that GLRaV-3 was the most common virus among the tested samples, and it has not been established that the infection by one or more viruses had affected the growth of shoot tips and buds in the tissue culture. Plants developed from samples collected during the winter period developed poorly and it was not possible to obtain the expected plant population. There was also a strong emergence of calf and, after subcultures were performed, ultimately all samples were eliminated from further research. During sampling at the beginning of vegetation, the amount of plant material was limited. Results obtained in this sampling term did not differ significantly from those in the winter period, and although plants for acclimatization were obtained, they did not survive this step. Likewise, plants in the meristem culture did not successfully develop from shoot tips sampled in the sampling term before flowering. In the sampling term after flowering, the meristems isolated from shoot tips were divided into two categories, those 1 mm in size and those larger than 1 mm. In this sampling term, plants for acclimatization were successfully obtained, which grew even after 7 months, and the most successfully developed plants were derived from the genotype 'Debit' 2. Based on the comparison of the success of the initial culture, plant regeneration and plant acclimatization, it was found that the most favorable term for plant material sampling to establish the meristem culture is the one after flowering and this sampling term can be recommended for further research.