Being part of the transgender community in the South can be challenging, to say the least. But there are people around the state devoting a good portion of their time, energy and resources to making life easier and friendlier for transgender people in Arkansas. Park West Pharmacy is one of those places. 

Located just off Chenal in Little Rock, Park West Pharmacy caters to transgender people around the state by providing niche services that can be hard to find. Owner Gwen Herzig, herself a transgender woman, understands firsthand how difficult it can be to secure medical care in a hostile state. So Herzig offers prescribed hormone therapies at cost for her patients and customers. She also provides injection supplies free of charge and gives injections to those who may not want to inject themselves. 

Park West Pharmacy has been in business more than 40 years. As a freshly minted licensed pharmacist in 2019, Herzig purchased the pharmacy from the original owner. While the pharmacy was serving its existing customer base, it had stopped growing, and Herzig determined the business needed a makeover. She dove into the job, her strong work ethic a coping mechanism to hide her gender dysphoria. 

At around the same time she purchased the pharmacy, Herzig began her gender transition. As she went through the process of coming out, living as a woman and beginning hormone therapies, she conferred with people in the medical community who treat and serve transgender people. With Herzig’s outreach and her firsthand knowledge of transgender issues, Park West Pharmacy began to grow in a new direction. 

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Park West Pharmacy continued offering services to the transgender market while also providing vaccines and building connections with advocacy groups like Arkansas Pride, Little Rock Black Pride and the Prism Foundation. Physicians and advocates referred patients and friends to Park West Pharmacy, sustaining it through the bleak first year of the pandemic.

The gift shop section of Park West Pharmacy offers anime and manga instead of candles and lotions.

At the same time, Park West Pharmacy added a second pharmacist, Herzig’s brother, Jesse Pruitt. With Pruitt on board, Herzig had time to focus on her physical transition. In July 2021 she traveled to San Francisco to complete a journey she had been on her entire life. As the business grew in the transgender and greater LGBTQ+ communities, Herzig said she lost some of her old customers. Eventually the decline leveled off, and Herzig said straight cisgender customers and LGBTQ+ customers exist in harmony when they pass each other in the pharmacy. She estimates a little over half of Park West’s business comes from the LGBTQ+ community, with roughly 15% of that being from the transgender community. 

A big piece of Park West Pharmacy’s work is providing prophylactic HIV treatments and counseling, and the pharmacy helps HIV-positive patients find payment options for expensive medications. The state of Arkansas has a seven-year contract with The Ryan White Foundation to provide AIDS medications to eligible patients, and Park West tries to help fill any gaps in coverage.

Park West Pharmacy’s gift shop has flair.

Every pharmacy in the country seems to have a gift shop in the front, as is true with Park West Pharmacy. Until recently you could find merchandise with LGBTQ+ colors and logos, saltwater taffy, Park West Pharmacy t-shirts, Dippin’ Dots and the requisite soda machine. In early 2022, Herzig and Pruitt opened Otaku Takeout out of their shared love of Japanese anime and manga. The shop is stocked with figurines, snacks, lights, jewelry and other distinctly Japanese knick knacks. You can find everything from Lay’s spicy squid potato chips to anime keychains, from Demon Slayer lights to cheese ramen, and video game merchandise from graphic T-shirts to plushies. At the grand opening of the Otaku Takeout storefront in April, the inventory almost sold out.

Herzig doesn’t confine her advocacy to the pharmacy. On a recent Saturday she took the mic at an abortion rights rally at the Arkansas Capitol and pledged to keep her mind and her business open to all comers. Arkansas law allows pharmacists to turn away customers with whom they morally disagree.  That won’t happen at Park West Pharmacy, Herzig said. “My pharmacy is here for you. My team is here for you.”

Supporting the Arkansas Times' independent journalism is more vital than ever. Help us deliver the latest daily reporting and analysis on news, politics, culture and food in Arkansas.

Founded 1974, the Arkansas Times is a lively, opinionated source for news, politics & culture in Arkansas. Our monthly magazine is free at over 500 locations in Central Arkansas.