CUPCAKES MADE ME RICH!
Elise Strachan certainly knows the ingredients to a successful career in baking. The self-confessed ‘cupcake queen’, 38, used to work as a flight attendant
– but swapped the skies for sugar and frosting when the popularity of her DIY baking Youtube channel exploded.
Most people could only dream of making a living from cakes and cupcakes, but it’s a reality for the mother of two.
“I left [working as a flight attendant] to start a cupcake business. It started with a little market stall and then a wedding cake business,” Elise tells New Idea.
“Then I started filming Youtube to get more customers to come and buy my cupcakes, and to order wedding cakes off me and it took off as my main business.”
Elise’s Youtube channel, Mycupcakeaddiction, quickly took off after it was launched in 2011, and she had soon amassed a loyal following with millions of viewers.
Her videos showed her subscribers how to make colourful, delicious cakes and baked goods – such as a Donut Drip Cake and Frozen cake pops.
Elise says her simple idea skyrocketed her into online fame because people love food, colour and watching her videos is a form of escapism for them.
“Because I have always been so passionate about cakes and baking, I was living and breathing cupcakes. I very much had my finger on the pulse of what was trending, what people wanted to see,” Elise explains.
“If there was a new Disney movie coming out, I would make sure I made a cupcake to celebrate it. Or if Christmas was coming up, I made sure I had my Christmas content up at a certain time.”
It didn’t take long for Mycupcakeaddiction to become Elise’s sole source of income. When a Youtube video surpasses a certain number of views, the site will pay the uploader for the amount of exposure it gives the advertisements. This can be thousands of dollars per video.
“MY HUSBAND EVEN QUIT HIS LUCRATIVE JOB TO BECOME MY RIGHT-HAND MAN”
“I was very cautious in the beginning because anything that is online, it can sometimes feel a bit flash in the pan,” Elise says.
“To have longevity in an industry like this, you really do need to have a solid business plan and a lot of drive.” “The biggest commitment that we put to it was when my husband quit his very lucrative government job to come and be my right-hand man. He’d always been my cameraman, and sort of head of editing. But when we gave up his full-time income because Youtube had replaced it, that was when we knew, ‘OK, we’re onto something big here’.” Becoming a household name on the internet
– even in the colourful and innocent world of cupcakes – can be an overwhelming journey.
But, as Elise explains, the community she has built is full of positive and incredible people who share her passion for baking.
“It was exciting. I was putting out stuff that I was very passionate about, and the more people that saw it, all of those views come with really positive, uplifting comments.
“It was crazy to think that many people loved cake. But it was also very heartening to see how many people loved my cakes specifically,” Elise says.
“Pun intended … it is one of the sweetest communities. If you’re someone that wants to watch another mum make cakes, you’re generally not the sort of person that’s then going to slag them off for it!”
The baking queen has now monetised her love for cupcakes even further with a new baking show on SBS, The Sweet Life with Elise Strachan.
In the two-part special, which also features other big-names in the cooking industry, Elise shows viewers how to make her most popular desserts, such as #Jellyart and #Giantbrioche.
The first episode features My Kitchen Rules 2016 winners Tasia and Gracia Seger, who put a unique Indonesian spin on the French classic crème brûlée.
“[The show] is not about the drama and the tears. It really is about the food. But the things that I’m looking at, we’re not just making another lasagne, we’re not just making another banana bread.
“We’ve got things on this TV show that are gigantic brioche stuffed with all of this rainbow of gelato,” Elise says.
“I had an amazing Malaysian cake decorator come in and teach me jelly art.
And the techniques and the things that they are doing, they’re just as ‘wow’ as Masterchef!”
• ‘The Sweet Life with Elise Strachan’ is now available on SBS On Demand.