{"id":369781,"date":"2025-12-26T10:07:09","date_gmt":"2025-12-26T10:07:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/369781\/"},"modified":"2025-12-26T10:07:09","modified_gmt":"2025-12-26T10:07:09","slug":"how-a-husband-and-wife-brought-free-derry-corner-inspired-wellness-shots-to-the-heart-of-east-belfast-and-beyond-the-irish-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/369781\/","title":{"rendered":"How a husband and wife brought Free Derry Corner-inspired wellness shots to the heart of east Belfast and beyond \u2013 The Irish News"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Derry woman<\/a> has told of how social media helped her launch a successful wellness shot business which now features on the shelves of more than 80 stores across the north and south \u2013 complete with a \u2018Free Derry Corner\u2019 inspired logo. <\/p>\n

Elaine Maxwell and her husband Paul launched their \u2018Wee Derry Shot\u2019 wellness business two years ago after they started to gain a following on TikTok<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The couple had been making the shots for themselves in their home for years prior, featuring natural ingredients including ginger, turmeric and garlic. <\/p>\n

Read more: British Airways wipes Derry off in-flight maps<\/a><\/p>\n

\"‘At<\/a>\"Popular<\/a><\/p>\n

However, after Elaine started to build up followers on the video-sharing platform and she showed her husband making his health \u201cconcoctions\u201d, she said that they were inundated with requests from people wanting to buy the product. <\/p>\n

\"TheThe couple’s original shot that they used to make in their kitchen has expanded into a full range PICTURE: WEE DERRY SHOTS <\/p>\n

It is now stocked in 83 stores, from greengrocers in the heart of east Belfast to filling stations in border towns, and is shipped twice-weekly to customers across Ireland as well as in England, Scotland and Wales.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople asked me to make it for them,\u201d Ms Maxwell told The Irish News. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d never seen anything like it, it was like a phenomenon.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople asked then, \u2018Could you make one with no garlic?\u2019 and \u2018Could you make one like this?\u2019 \u2013 so that\u2019s how all the different bottles came about, to try and please everybody. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think there\u2019s nine different bottles now,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\"ElaineElaine and Paul started making their health shots at home before demand on social media helped them launch a successful business PICTURE: ELAINE MAXWELL <\/p>\n

The business began in their home kitchen before they eventually had to build a separate kitchen unit at the back of their house. <\/p>\n

Ms Maxwell said production has since moved into a unit with an industrial kitchen.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had to move out of the kitchen within four months,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were only in our unit, we got it built, and we were only in there eight or nine months. It was no good, we couldn\u2019t keep up with demand.<\/p>\n

\u201cBack then, we were doing everything by hand; I was hand-peeling big bags of garlic and everything \u2013 my hands were burning.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just amazing how far it\u2019s come. Everybody knows the Wee Derry Shots.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms Maxwell said that they now rely on family and friends to help them out with making their products. <\/p>\n

The business\u2019 success has seen Derry\u2019s iconic \u2018Free Derry Corner\u2019 gable wall, which features on their product\u2019s logo, travel to places it wouldn\u2019t normally have before \u2013 including the US. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe even had an American tourist here; they took it home with them, and they loved it,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

\u201cFree Derry Corner is a symbol of Derry, and we\u2019ve done the Wee Derry Shot \u2013 it just came into our mind straight away, because it\u2019s for everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n

She added that the rapid success of their business would \u201cnever\u201d have been possible without TikTok, where she has over 90,000 followers and almost three million likes. <\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t believe it. I still don\u2019t know how I even got there,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSince our business has become successful, I\u2019ve had crazy trolls.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is hard and you have to put on a brave face all the time.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut for every bad troll you have, you\u2019re going to find some good ones \u2013 and there\u2019s just lovely, lovely people out there.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Derry woman has told of how social media helped her launch a successful wellness shot business which…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":369782,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[49,48,90450,84,377,1059,406],"class_list":{"0":"post-369781","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-medication","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-derry","11":"tag-health","12":"tag-medication","13":"tag-tiktok","14":"tag-wellness"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=369781"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369781\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/369782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=369781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=369781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=369781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}