When one chooses to use GNU Guix, you're already entering the "exotic distros" terrain. Not using the most used initialization system definitely doesn't help here.
That's really not true. We just don't use it.
The reason is that GNU Shepherd is also written in Guile, so we can extend it with code that's already in Guix, e.g. for containerization of services.
Nobody can claim that the Shepherd is objectively better or more feature rich than systemd. It's not. Nor is it more "unixy" --- it most definitely is not. If systemd-haters come to Guix because they despise systemd and want something small and simple they won't be happy with the Shepherd.
I mean, it could work, but part of Guix's appeal is using the same language (scheme) for managing all aspects of the system. I admit that's a steep requirement (I'm a beginner at lisp/scheme).
How to start/stop/restart services, write a startup script, check logs... have been a common google search for anyone using more than one Linux distro, or docker/lxd