Bonang Matheba has never hidden her affection for champagne. Long before the fashion-and-fizz glow-up, her fans—who know her best as “Queen B”—were already hearing her signature enthusiasm for “Champagne darling!” from her YouTube days, with the bubbly clearly more than just a passing indulgence.
As her career shifted and her public image grew, she leaned fully into that sparkling identity. Once her reality TV presence put her even more firmly in the spotlight, it also became clear she wasn’t interested in quietly staying in the background—she was ready to “give the people what they want,” and she did exactly that, with bubbles at the center of it all.
Instead of lending her name to a brand that already existed, Matheba took a different route. She spent more than two years building her own label from the ground up, keeping a close hand on the creative and product decisions throughout the process.
The outcome was House of BNG, a Méthode Cap Classique collection made using Cape grapes. The brand launched in March 2019 in collaboration with Cape Wine Master Jeff Grier, and it was far from a hands-off celebrity endorsement. From the start, Matheba was involved in details that wine lovers obsess over—everything from dialing in the balance between bitter and sweet to determining the size of the bubbles.
At launch, she framed the project as both personal and proudly local. “We have some of the world’s best grapes here in South Africa,” she said then. “This is my love letter to Africa, and I’m excited to introduce it to the world.”
The response was swift and loud. Both the Brut NV and Brut Rosé NV sold out online and in Woolworths stores within their first week, and the early excitement translated into more than a billion impressions on X (previously known as Twitter). By September 2020—just a little over a year after launch—House of BNG had climbed to become the top-selling MCC brand at Woolworths.
Matheba’s influence extended beyond sales. She became the first Black woman to join the Cap Classique Producers Association, a major industry milestone that arrived alongside another landmark moment shortly after the label’s debut. Two months after House of BNG launched, it was chosen to provide sparkling wine for President Cyril Ramaphosa’s inauguration at Loftus Stadium, making Matheba the first female MCC producer to supply a presidential inauguration.
Since those early chapters, the brand’s offering has expanded in a big way. In 2020, a premium Prestige Reserve MCC arrived, with the wine aged on the lees for several years. The range also includes canned sparkling wines—Nectar Blanc and Nectar Rosé—and, beginning in July 2024, a non-alcoholic version, Nectar Rosé Non-Alcoholic, available in a 250ml can. Looking ahead, a brunch-inspired canned Mimosa is set to roll out in early 2026.
House of BNG hasn’t stayed confined to bottles and cans, either. The brand has become a regular presence at premium events and has maintained a multi-year partnership with the Miss South Africa pageant. On the partnerships she chooses, Matheba has said that any platform supporting and uplifting women in the country will always have her backing.
And as her business and brand footprint keep growing, the conversation around her ambitions continues as well—particularly her drive to expand beyond the spotlight and into the spaces where stories are shaped and elevated on every stage.
