“I like the social aspect of it,” Tim Cooney says while appropriately having a cocktail with me. He is the owner of Simply Cocktails, which provides bartending Services for weddings and events in Santa Barbara, Montecito, Santa Ynez, Goleta and the surrounding cities. “I was shy and an introvert growing up,” he shares. “Bartending loosened me up. I’ve gotten to know everybody in town." The latter fact is not an exaggeration. While interviewing Tim, we are repeatedly interrupted by people coming over to say hello. He’s gregarious and affable -- with everyone.
His parents are from Santa Barbara, but he was born in San Francisco. They came back when he was 3 years old. He attended San Marcos High School and went to UCSB on a soccer scholarship. “I was bartending while going to school and was offered a job running “The Tank,” he recalls. He became the general manager of the then popular establishment on State Street. “It was my first jump into management,” he says. His parents talked him into leaving school for he wasn’t taking it very seriously. “I went to school for athletics, and I didn’t parlay that into a good experience,” he explains. “I hated Isla Vista, and I needed a change.” Besides, he enjoyed working in the restaurant business, which became his true calling.
Eventually he owned his own nightclub called “Cooney’s.” This was around the time his wife was expecting their first child. From “Cooney’s,” he went to “Holdren’s” for 7 years as bar manager as well as filling in as bartender some nights at Tonic.