A Poor Bronx Gay Kid Becomes AF Pilot and A Multimedia Sensation
How did a kid from the Bronx grow up to be a pilot in the Air Force Reserves and then become a gay multimedia powerhouse?
DJ Doran is the CEO and publisher of Doran OmniMedia. Doran OmniMedia includes two different newspapers called The Eagle, one, the largest LGBTQ newspaper in the Midwest, is based in Indianapolis. The other is based in Chicago. Doran OmniMedia, also, includes Gaycation Magazine, distributed in the continental U.S., Canada and Mexico, KWIR Radio, an LGBTQ internet radio network and Rainbow Tourism, a booking site based in Australia.
Doran started his working career flying C-130 planes in the reserves for 23 years. His path from flying planes in the reserves to managing hotels and brokering hotel deals to becoming a multimedia publisher was circuitous, at best, and a positive example for anyone in the queer community.
As an openly gay entrepreneur and CEO who came out of the closet later in life, Doran has a lot of insight for queer people looking to chart their own course to success. Doran’s Life
While sitting in a coffee shop one day, Doran overheard a gentleman talking of selling his 75-room hotel off the Oregon coast. The hotel owner was frustrated because he felt he was being taken advantage of by his attorney. Doran, having recently retired from the reserves, saw an opportunity and said to the hotel owner, “Maybe I can help you.” Four and a half weeks later, Doran owned the hotel and received a $25,000 check from the seller.
At the time and to the chagrin of his husband, Joe Morales, Doran knew nothing about running hotels. He believed, however, that he could learn anything and buried himself in every book about hotel management that he could find.
Owning and managing this hotel proved challenging. After his purchase, Doran learned that the original hotel owner was in foreclosure with the hotel builder, who still held the note. Shortly after Doran’s purchase, the builder tried to take possession of the hotel. In response, Doran filed for Chapter 11 to get an automatic stay. Doran took the builder to court and lost later that year.
Even though Doran lost the case, he walked away with a healthy profit and learned lessons that have proved valuable later in his career. Armed with more knowledge, Doran and Morales continued to buy distressed hotels until they had five mid-tier hotels in their portfolio.
By the time the economy showed signs of weakness in 2008 and after a stint helping to build a hotel brokerage in Chicago, Doran got out of real estate altogether. After dabbling in a few other industries, he found his way into publishing. After a rough start with a boating magazine that included an attempted takeover and cyberbullying, Doran and Morales venture into publishing again but with a magazine of their own started from scratch.
That’s when Gaycation Magazine was born. Gaycation is the travel magazine for LGBTQ people looking for higher-end experiences. Doran OmniMedia’s inaugural magazine led to the sister Eagle Magazines, KWIR Radio and Rainbow Tourism, all of which are designed to help queer people live better lives and build stronger relationships amongst one another and between the queer and straight communities.
Doran’s Lessons
Throughout his career, Doran has maintained his drive despite apparent failures. He admits to having more failures than successes but says he’s persevered because of his belief in his abilities and determination to succeed. Doran’s naysayers attribute his success to luck, and his response is that luck has nothing to do with success. His success is contingent on his willingness to see opportunities and to learn.
Doran credits much of his successes to his openness in seeing opportunities. As with purchasing his first hotel, many people wouldn’t have seen that opportunity had they been sitting in that coffee shop that day. While luck is preparation meeting opportunity, it’s courage that makes one act. This means one must tune out the external and internal negativity with which we all struggle.
Doran clarifies that it’s not able being fearless in business and life, an oft credited characteristic of successful people. It’s about overcoming the fear we all have. Negotiating deals is scary, but accept that you’re scared and proceed anyway
More importantly, Doran says that he’s not afraid to ask for what he wants, knowing the answer could as easily be a yes as a no. Because of limiting beliefs, too many people, especially in the queer community, are defeated in their minds before they even start negotiating. Doran sees no value in that.
He says, “You have no idea what the other person’s circumstances are when you’re negotiating a deal, whether it’s for real estate or a newspaper. So, don’t be afraid to ask for what you want because your wish and their circumstance may be aligned.”
Doran also believes in the power of education. Everything he’s accomplished he’s done because he’s educated himself. “If someone can read, understand and apply what they’ve read, they can do anything they want,” Doran says.
Looking back on his first attempt at publishing, Doran’s happy it didn’t go smoothly. He says without that experience, he never would’ve learned the lessons he needed to start Gaycation and expand into newspaper publishing in Indianapolis and Chicago. Of his ability to overcome that hurdle, Doran says, “You make your own reality.” You can’t change the past, you can only learn from it and look forward.
With a career that’s gone from multiple successes to failure multiple times, Doran attributes his continued positive outlook to his and Morales’ faith in each other and his belief that “if this doesn’t work out, I can learn something else and that will work out.”
Doran’s Future
In addition to growing Doran OmniMedia, Doran is focused on his LGBTQ goodwill tour, Pride Flight 2018. Doran will be flying a restored DC-3, a World War II-era transport plane, on a goodwill tour around the world. Doran calls it “an around-the-world goodwill mission to promote friendship through civilian aviation” and is intended to clear up misconceptions and hostilities towards the queer community.
For Doran, all his adventures, successes and failures come down to a lesson he learned from his mother. She said, “If you concentrate on being a good human being first and foremost, then everything you do, everything you are, everything you’re involved in will be filtered through that, and you’ll be okay.”
, Cashing in on fabulous with queer money.
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