There’s a line out the door as early as 9 a.m. some mornings at South La Brea Avenue’s Met Her at a Bar. On the other side of the crosswalk, locals sip craft cocktails and twirl handmade noodles at Met Him at a Bar. Just next door, there’s traditional Thai street food at Her Thai. In just six years, Vinny and Mindy Kinne, co-owners of all three restaurants, have quietly taken over a whole corner of South La Brea Avenue and 8th Street in Mid-City, all while catering to their most loyal fanbase, their neighbors.

The couple has served continuous crowds while maintaining a local, neighborhood feel, seemingly slipping under the radar in the otherwise crowded Los Angeles brunch scene. Their model is simple; they have expanded at their own pace, only opening each restaurant once they feel truly ready.

Brook Olsen and Avery-Claire Masselink

“It all started with the neighborhood,” Mindy says, pointing out how the surrounding area has helped the restaurants to stay busy right from opening. As a bonus, the Kinnes live nearby, which has allowed them to develop relationships with their guests and local restaurant owners and staff. Their presence is known by their neighbors, and they wouldn’t have it any other way.

Vinny and Mindy’s emergence as major neighborhood restaurant players isn’t the only fast-tracked part of their lives. The two quite literally met at a bar in 2014, got engaged in 2016, opened Met Her in 2017, and got married in 2019.

Since 2017, diners have been enjoying Met Her’s uber-popular Thai fried chicken and waffles, made with homemade waffle batter, tom yum seasoning, and crispy basil. It’s also been serving the khai jiao, or Thai omelet filled with maple sausage, jasmine rice, fresh tomato, and sriracha, and the wafflebello sandwich, which comes with portobello mushroom, fried egg, vegetables, and cilantro aioli.

Just before the start of the pandemic in 2020, the duo opened Met Him at a Bar, an homage to Vinny’s Italian roots. They say that the opening weekend was packed, and the team served bolognese, rigatoni vodka, and Nonna’s Meatballs, a recipe passed down from Vinny’s grandmother.

With Her Thai, which opened May 24, 2023, Mindy honors her mother by making the Thai street food that she grew up eating and cooking with her own mother on the streets of Bangkok. Mindy even designed the restaurant with a to-go concept. The family history comes through in Her Thai’s pad thai, which is sweet and sour, with umami from dried shrimp, and finished off garnished with radishes. The menu also features a Tiger Dog, a Thai hot dog with homemade sausage, crushed peanuts, cilantro, and chili garlic aioli.

With all restaurants, the team has had packed crowds since each spot’s opening day, and has continued to play to long lines of local fans since then. Amazingly, they’ve done it all with little to no outside help in the way of a public relations or marketing team, doing all social media themselves. The rest of their success is due in large part to word of mouth.

The main passion that led to starting their bars and restaurants is the Kinnes’ love of hospitality, which is evident in their constant presence in each of their restaurants. “I always tell the employees it’s not a hard concept. It’s just like when you have guests over at your house. I just want them to feel like they’re at home with their friends or their family having dinner. That’s the best. I want to emulate that in my restaurant,” says Vinny.

Brook Olsen and Avery-Claire Masselink

Brook Olsen and Avery-Claire Masselink

As business partners, the Kinnes have found balance in their working relationship and have seen success by separating responsibilities. Mindy’s domain is in the kitchen, working hard to create recipes for each of their restaurants, drawing from her extensive food science background. Vinny brings his personality to the front of house and social media. At the end of the day, their model is simple, but they’ve found it’s what’s worked for them and what has carried them through all of these years.

“We really want to make it the center. A restaurant should be the center where you bring the community together. It doesn’t matter how many restaurants we have, I want our culture to be that homey, fun, good food spot that you can always depend on where you’re going to have a good time,” says Vinny.

“We care, so we’re here a lot. We know all the regulars, all the neighbors. It’s like hanging out with your friends around here. It’s awesome,” Mindy says.

Vinny echoes that sentiment. “We’re always in and out, like fooling around with the guests, having fun, getting them a drink on us, just making sure they’re just having fun.”

Resisting the urge to expand before they are ready, the Kinnes have chosen to move at a pace that has worked for them, placing heavy emphasis on their staff, and getting everything just right, one restaurant at a time. “We don’t want to expand too fast and the quality goes down,” Mindy says.

In this intentional, sustainable expansion, the team is bringing their popular brunch spot, Met Her at a Bar, to Main Street in Santa Monica soon. The space will be designed by Sormeh Rienne, who also put together Her Thai and is working on design upgrades to Met Him at a Bar. The Kinnes also rolling out an upgraded cocktail menu and will soon begin offering Neapolitan-style pizza at Met Him at a Bar. More updates can be found on each of the restaurant’s Instagram accounts.