Matthew McIvor, started Proudly Serving simply out of necessity during the pandemic. After losing a majority of his restaurant clients within his PR firm, the next logical step was to create a restaurant of his own. 

Alongside his wife, Matt ran Localite LA, a hospitality-based public relations firm for more than 8 years but that came to a sudden halt when COVID hit. Although he did have plans to open a restaurant at some point, it never was supposed to be focused on burgers.       

Matt knew if he was able to create a great burger, it would be a success solely because of his marketing and branding background. After about a dozen variations, the PS burger was created and Proudly Serving began in Matt's driveway. With some minimal promotion, the first few pop ups garnered friends, family and neighbors who all had positive feedback.      

That feedback gave him enough confidence to begin searching for a place to serve outside of a driveway but knew he would have to straighten a few things out first. That meant finding someone to run this with and who had more kitchen experience than he did when it came to running a kitchen. He connected with Kevin Malone, a former colleague and the rest is history.