Meet Nicole Holland | Cactus Mart owner

Keeping the history of the store intact. Not changing. We still operate with the old keyed style registers and have chickens and cats running around everywhere, THIS IS THE WAY ITS ALWAYS BEEN. When people come in for the first time, they say it’s like walking into a time machine from the old desert days…… and I’m okay with that. Our concept has always been to keep the integrity of old desert lifestyle  alive.

YES, It’s about keeping the respect of the desert alive. Coming into the store you start entering all the greenhouses and everything that is grown by us or local growers. Plants and cactus that are adapted to our unique desert environment. Going into our gift-shop you get to see a collection  of long time resident local artistry, local wildlife photographer David McChesney on the walls and hand thrown potters succulent surprises on the shelves.

Our mission is to truly keep everything as local as possible.

Even down to our honey and locally roasted coffee.

Definitely hiking into our local Morongo preserve to see the abundance of wildlife and bog lands. Which always is a surprise to out of towners. Walking the street in pioneertown has always been one of my favorite past times and having drinks at long time establishment  Pappys and Harriet’s. Checking out the local vintage stores are a must for anyone’s first trip to the high desert as well.

I was lucky enough to have many teachers and a great mentor & boss when I entered into the landscape world in my early 20’s. It definitely brought out my love of plants and understanding the harmonious dance between flora/fauna/(desert ecology.)