Coffee entrepreneur, Sbu Nkolothi, the owner and inspiration behind Coffee LAB in Ballito, was chosen as the province’s top coffee venue in the Battle of the Beans competition sponsored by Selati Sugar.
Nkolothi hails from Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe where he started out as a golf caddy before moving to Durban during the FIFA World Cup in 2010. After a variety of odd jobs, he started working at a popular restaurant where he learned to make coffee and appreciate good food.
Soon, he was making coffee at workspaces and learning everything he could from the coffee mentors who took him under his wing.
He also became interested in the history of coffee making and studied everything he could about it. He went on to train baristas, which he says was an important opportunity to uplift people and develop skills that would, ultimately, lead to work opportunities.
In 2020, he opened Coffee LAB, which was almost an immediate hit. However, this extremely modest entrepreneur believes the value of good coffee does not remain in the cup. “Coffee brings people together. It connects them. When I make coffee, I’m able to engage in and build relationships with them through my coffee. I love people,” he says.
Asked how he was drawn to coffee, Nkolothi says: “The funny thing is coffee found me - it was a surprise. I started in 2010 as a barista at Mama Luciana’s. It was my big coffee break and there was this big coffee machine and I was the guy. The coffee was just giving me peace and love and connecting me with people ever since.”
He then started a facebook page to learn more and connect with coffee professionals all over the world. “Everything started to shape up. I was understanding what coffee was all about, training myself, and communicating with people. Coffee is more about character.
“Attitude is everything. You can be the best barista in the world but if your character is not right, you are not authentic.”
He soon started training other baristas.
The Coffee Lab was a dream. “It was never meant to be a coffee shop, but more a coffee cabin,” he says. Retrenched in 2020, he got a call from the art gallery to open in the foyer. “When something is meant to be, it’s meant to be,” Nkolothi says. “Up until today coffee has been a passion.”
Nkolothi has three young girls and loves reading. He also loves it when people drop by to watch football. He’s a Liverpool fan.
The first runner up in the Battle of the Beans was Lineage, Hillcrest whose owner, Craig Charity, has been at the forefront of coffee roasting and making in KZN for over a decade.
The second runner up was another relative newcomer to the industry, Skyline Salt Rock. Originally the coffee shop was part of Skyline Coffee Roasters in Morningside but new owner, Darren Lewis, bought the shop in 2023. He says he bought the venue due to its great community spirit. He was a former regional manager for Vida e in KZN.
“A good coffee shop is about serving consistently good coffee and food, knowing every regular’s coffee order and name. We have over 100 regulars who come to the store five to six times a week,” he says.
Top barista was Keagon Chavoos from Crane Flower Coffee in Kloof.