Meet Colette Doran

We were lucky to catch up with Colette Doran recently and have shared our conversation below.

Colette , appreciate you making time for us and sharing your wisdom with the community. So many of us go through similar pain points throughout our journeys and so hearing about how others overcame obstacles can be helpful. One of those struggles is keeping creativity alive despite all the stresses, challenges and problems we might be dealing with. How do you keep your creativity alive?

You often think of the main cocktail ingredients when you think of mixology – liquor, citrus juice and a sweetener like simple syrup. When you begin to add out of the box ingredients such as vegetables, coffee, yogurt, herbs, etc. the options become endless. Whenever I get into a creative rut, I find a unique ingredient and research good flavor pairings and take it from there!

Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?

I’ve always enjoyed a good cocktail. However, I always enjoyed them at a bar where someone else was making them. Around 5 years ago, I decided to take a stab at making an old fashioned at home. As cliche as it sounds – the rest was history! I simply couldn’t get enough of experimenting with cocktails at home. About a year after that first old fashioned, I decided to make an Instagram account to share my favorite cocktail recipes that I found online.

Fast forward 4 years later, Colette’s Cocktails (@colettescocktails) has grown from 10 of my close friends and family to almost 30,000 people following along my mixology journey – I still can’t believe it! I post all of my own recipes, barware and tips to making cocktails at home easy and understandable. The biggest thing I want people to know is that you can have craft cocktails in the comfort of your own kitchen…and it doesn’t need to be perfect! Making cocktails is all about what you want the taste and presentation to be!

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

I would say the three biggest qualities to have to venture into content creation on social media is patience, consistency and honestly…lack of embarrassment!

It took about 3 years for Colette’s Cocktails to go anywhere. It was very easy to question within those three years why I was spending so much time filming, editing and curating an online presence when it was really just my friends and family commenting “Yum!” on all my videos (bless their hearts). The patience and consistency of posting almost everyday is truly the only reason it finally started working. It just takes one or two videos to blow up to get people to notice you and from there, it’s only up!

As for the lack of embarrassment, I think that goes without saying. Talking to a camera all alone in your kitchen and then posting it online for your family, friends, coworkers and the world to see isn’t the easiest thing to do for an introvert like myself, but it was so worth it!

Who has been most helpful in helping you overcome challenges or build and develop the essential skills, qualities or knowledge you needed to be successful?

As someone who has created hundreds of cocktail recipes but has never worked in a bar, you might wonder where the knowledge even comes from. Well, it’s all from those who came before me! I obsessively watched other content creators on Youtube, Instagram and Tik Tok. There are so many incredibly talented creators out there who still blow my mind to this day with the ideas they have and career moves they make. It is incredibly inspiring to watch creative people make their stamp on the world and I only hope I can make mine one day!

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @colettescocktails
• Other: Tik Tok: @colettescocktails

Image Credits

Laurie Tarasi Photography (@laurietarasiphotography)