Meet Justin Galicz | Co-Owner of The Little Gay Shop

We had the good fortune of connecting with Justin Galicz and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Justin, what was your thought process behind starting your own business?
We started The Little Gay Shop as a way to uplift, promote, and center queer artists and makers. Too often, queer people are unfairly compensated or overlooked for jobs, so The Little Gay Shop serves as a one-stop shop to amplify the work of the entire LGBTQIAP+ community.

Growing up, we hardly ever saw ourselves or our experiences shown in the media, so we wanted to create a space where every single person, regardless of age, race, identity, gender, or experience, sees themselves represented in some capacity. The queer experience is diverse and beautiful, and we wanted to create a physical and digital space that shows that.

What should our readers know about your business?
The Little Gay Shop is a marketplace sourcing art, books, magazines, apparel, and more from small, independent, queer-identifying individuals from around the world. We serve to uplift, amplify, and most importantly, fairly compensate artists and makers for their work. We want to create a space where every queer person, regardless of their race, gender, sexual identity, age, history, and socioeconomic status is able to experience art and see themselves reflected in the shop. Too often, queer people grow up never seeing themselves in media, books, movies, etc, so we want to ensure every group is represented and celebrated.

We started the shop as a simple table pop-up. We would go to different venues and sell art. When the pandemic started and every venue and event shut down, we stumbled on the listing for the storage container and decided to give it a try. Worst case, it would be a very expensive storage unit for us….but luckily it took off and has continued to grow since. We’ve expanded into a bigger space, added coffee, expanded to 7 days a week, hired 3 more team members, started a gallery, and hosted many events.

The shop is run by me and my husband Kirt. The hardest part is juggling this with our regular full-time jobs, but we are continuing to refine our processes and expand our team so we can continue to grow. As grinding as running a business can be, we are extremely lucky to have an amazing community supporting us, a talented team to lean on, and partners that just want to help us be successful.

The most fulfilling part of our job is seeing kids come in and watching their eyes light up with joy because they finally feel represented and seen. They are just so happy to be in a safe space and be exposed to queer culture in this capacity because a store like this doesn’t exist elsewhere.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
A weeklong trip would definitely revolve around food and drink!

Some of our favorite places to eat include (we are vegetarian so sorry meat eaters..):
Bouldin Creek Cafe
Veracruz for breakfast tacos
Spicy Boys food truck
Kinda Tropical
Jacoby’s
Hillside Farmacy
Odd Duck for happy hour
Sunny’s food truck

For coffee:
Flat Track
Fleet
Civil Goat
Try Hard

For alcohol:
St. Elmo Brewery
Meanwhile brewery
Zilker brewery
Jester King
Whislers for a cocktail
Hula Hut for a margarita on the water

Shops:
Parts and Labour
Room Service Vintage
Take Heart
Z Threads
Paper Craft and Pantry

Things to do:
Visit the Blanton
Barton Springs pool and Zilker park
Listen to music at Cheer Up Charlies
Take a 4-day trip out to Marfa
Black History Bike Ride
Shop on South Congress

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
We wouldn’t be here today if it weren’t for the queer elders who came before us. They fought back against a system of oppression so that we could be more accepted and have equal freedoms and opportunities. While that fight is no where close to over, our ability to be out, to be visible, and to be proud, is because of the hard work and sacrifice of the queer people who came before us.

Website: thelittlegayshop.com

Instagram: @thelittlegayshop

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheLilGayShop

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheLittleGayShop