I found that what was killing my elixir gain was the troop cost plus 5 spells on every raid. I started using GoWiWi based armies to cut down on the elixir usage a bit and found I was slowly building pink again. As I was constantly full on DE it was a good way to burn some as well.
I also got pretty selective on the base I hit as was mentioned above. I started looking for bases where I would take at least 2 fullish elixir storages on the way to the TH that also offered good (not great) cups.
If I was pushing now in Champs or Titan I personally would replace jump spells with EQ to cut down elixir usage even more. Make a big hole right into the core and profit!
luck mate!

