The Purple Onion Cafe, which will celebrate its 20th year this spring, began as a catering business in Campbell in 2004, before opening in April 2006 in Los Gatos. Business partners Steve Angelo and Lisa Kilkenny met at a restaurant in 1995 called A Matter of Taste, across the street where Namaste is now. Kilkenny was the pastry chef. Angelo began working there when his cousins scored him a job. The two hit it off and, less than a decade later, began their own business.
The Purple Onion moved into the former home of Cafe Siena, at 26 E. Main St. Once the lease was signed, Angelo and Kilkenny had just four days to get situated. They were concerned the Cafe Siena regulars might change their morning routine. The Cafe Siena customers were sad to have lost their regular spot. They knew that they had big shoes to fill.
Both Angelo and Kilkenny credit their resilience to their focus in their business, including continually reinventing their menu.
“When Covid came in, I thought we had to do dinners, and it wasn’t really doing what we thought it could,” said Angelo, describing how their plans to expand at the time fell through. “And by default, our food lent itself to takeout.” The possibility of new dining places opening nearby didn’t bring up any insecurities, since they both felt they had found their niche.
Both Angelo and Kilkenny see the Purple Onion as a dining place that leads with food, followed by coffee.
“It’s the only thing I really wanted to do,” Kilkenny said of her path in life.
Looking back, Kilkenny says that what she cherishes most is watching their kids work at the Purple Onion.
Photographs of Angelo’s great grandfather’s market are framed on the walls inside the cafe. And now, Angelo’s son now works here while he attends Los Gatos High School.
Angelo also experienced a major tragedy—when he lost his son Lukas 10 years ago in a car accident. Lukas was just a freshman at Archbishop Mitty High School.
Then, they faced a business setback, too, when their chef decided to quit four days before Thanksgiving.
“It’s a blessing,” he said. “It’s made me appreciate things in a much deeper fashion and be more in the moment—and appreciate the relationships I have with people. Putting me back in the kitchen at that time was also a blessing, because I had friends that I met through grief.”
That sense of purpose drove Angelo more into his work, since he’d taken over the head chef duties. Despite all of the positives that have come out of the business in the last twenty years, Angelo says he would trade it all to have his son back.
Staying alive and thriving
Through the adversities that come with life, Angelo says he’s become more compassionate, and applies that trait towards his business. Angelo says that minor inconveniences, such as the current price of eggs rising due to inflation, is no match for what they’ve been through.
Angelo says that the Town of Los Gatos is more understanding of entrepreneurship compared to what he’s seen elsewhere in recent years.
The Purple Onion location at Winchester Boulevard and Knowles Avenue is celebrating their 12th anniversary this year.
They attempted to launch a third Purple Onion Cafe on Lincoln Avenue in Willow Glen, yet that didn’t work out, considering the launch happened at the start of Covid.
“No one wishes to close a business once they open it,” reflected Kilkenny.
Nevertheless, 20 in Los Gatos is quite a badge of success for any business, especially a food and beverage operation, as that is a famously challenging sector.
The front of the house is overseen by Kilkenny, while Angelo is more back-of-the-house, monitoring the kitchen. How well the two business partners compliment one another can be attested to by the way each person wears their own hat. Angelo’s son has shown interest in carrying on the business into the future, though as of now he is satisfied with how business is, especially after Covid acting as a reality check.
What about trying a third Purple Onion location again?
“As the business grows, I wouldn’t be against it,” Angelo commented.
He’s also looking at the option of opening a barbeque spot, one day.
After all of these years with the 20 year celebration approaching this spring, Angelo and Kilkenny both say that what they want to tell the town is, “Thank you.”
Having been in business for nearly 20 years, both Kilkenny and Angelo share each of their fondest memories of gratitude: Kilkenny says that, upon reopening from the Covid shutdown, a customer came in and tipped a $100 bill as a token of gratitude. It brought tears to her eyes. Angelo remembers a group of guys who ride their bikes on the weekends. They come into the Purple Onion—and have a neon sign with their business’s name on it—and come in the back to dine on the weekends.
Gestures like these act as reminders of the importance of community, and for the need to recognize important milestones such as two decades of survival for a unique downtown cafe.
