20/02/2026
🙌🏼🙌🏼 We did it team! Thank you to our amazing community for the constant support.
So, over the last few weeks we have given the proprietors of winning coffee shops a chance to "speak"; to share their views on what makes for a winning forumula. Now it's the chance of Craig Charity, owner of Lineage Coffee which recently took top spot in the Battle of the Beans's 2025. competition, sponsored by Selati Sugar.
Craig has much to be proud of. So, not only did Lineage take the number 1 spot of Best Coffee Shop in KwaZulu Natal, Lineage Coffee Nottingham Road, was judged to be one of the top three best shops in the Pietermaritzburg and Midlands area and its barista, Mfana Zibula, also won Best Barista for the same area.
Over to Craig::
"I attribute it (our success) to the fact that we treat coffee as a collective effort. At Lineage, we have the technical side down to a science, but the atmosphere is a living thing created by our people. We focus on individual brilliance rather than just uniformed staffers; we want the personalities of our team members to shine through in their work. When you pair that with a customer base that truly engages with us, you get a culture that writes its own success story. The awards are just a reflection of that connection."
