{"id":239304,"date":"2026-03-27T14:42:14","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T14:42:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/239304\/"},"modified":"2026-03-27T14:42:14","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T14:42:14","slug":"talinis-nursery-in-east-sacramento-celebrates-50-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/239304\/","title":{"rendered":"Talini\u2019s Nursery in East Sacramento celebrates 50 years"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the cultural background of Sacramento\u2019s Little Italy Historic District<\/a> has become diluted in recent decades, one small business in the area is celebrating a major milestone and still honoring its Italian roots.<\/p>\n

Talini\u2019s Nursery & Garden Center<\/a> has sat on the corner of Folsom Boulevard and 56th Street in East Sacramento for 50 years, through a financial crisis, a pandemic and a massively changing business landscape.<\/p>\n

Kevin Johnson, the nursery\u2019s co-owner and nursery manager, said the family-owned shop won\u2019t go away anytime soon.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve just been a staple in the community, being able to provide just all the plants, flowers, vegetables, soils, for people to enjoy for their gardens, and our plan is to be here for another 50 years,\u201d Johnson said.<\/p>\n

Johnson has only worked in the large Talini\u2019s nursery for about six years. But he\u2019s been in the family business fold for more than two decades. He married the nursery founder\u2019s granddaughter, Luciana Talini \u2014 now Johnson \u2014 in 2003, and learned everything he knows about gardening and horticulture from the Talini family and their business\u2019s longtime employees.<\/p>\n

Though Johnson is acutely aware of the drastic changes to the nursery industry\u2019s landscape, he said the family-owned plant store\u2019s longevity in the region and role during difficult times has helped cement it as a community cornerstone for years to come.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have good customer loyalty,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cIt\u2019s about being dependable … and I think people have gravitated to that.\u201d<\/p>\n

In honor of 50 years running, Johnson said Talini\u2019s will host occasional sales throughout the year on nursery goods, which will be announced online ahead of time.<\/p>\n

\"Nursery Nursery manager Kevin Johnson, grandson-in-law of original owner Pietro Talini, stands at Talini\u2019s Nursery in Sacramento on Tuesday. PAUL KITAGAKI JR. pkitagaki@sacbee.com From Italy to Little Italy: Talini\u2019s Nursery\u2019s history<\/p>\n

Italian immigrants Pietro Talini and son Luigi Talini established their family nursery business in 1976, roughly 30 years after moving to the U.S.<\/p>\n

The elder Talini didn\u2019t speak much English, but he knew a significant amount about horticulture from his time as head groundskeeper of The Vatican. He worked in the asparagus fields in the Central Valley after immigrating, but his ultimate goal was to get a business license for a landscaping operation.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Pietro Talini) got his business license by being able to label (the plants) around the Capitol in Latin,\u201d Johnson said. \u201c(State officials were) like, \u2018You are more than qualified.\u2019 … So he got his business license not speaking the best English at the time, but knowing the knowledge.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Talinis set up a space at 5601 Folsom Blvd. to store their landscaping equipment and excess plants while they launched their business. According to Johnson, Pietro Talini found a deep love for selling flowers and other plants. The business naturally pivoted, becoming a \u201cfull-blown\u201d retail plant store and nursery in its budding days.<\/p>\n

Pietro Talini died in the early 1980s and Luigi Talini took over, establishing the nursery as a place for Sacramento gardeners and homeowners to find high-quality plants and helpful service.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s still some people that come that have been here since the beginning,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cThey remember (the space\u2019s history) because it used to be an old rose shop.\u201d<\/p>\n

Luciana Johnson grew up around her grandfather\u2019s plant store, and now her daughters are the fourth generation of Talinis who spent ample time of their childhood among the seeds and starts in East Sacramento.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy kids grew up walking here,\u201d Kevin Johnson said. \u201cIt\u2019s fun to see people bringing in their kids, their little toddlers, and they\u2019re just bopping around and seeing all the flowers and learning \u2014 it\u2019s just awesome.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Worker Worker Martin Palomar water plants at Talini’s Nursery on Tuesday. PAUL KITAGAKI JR. pkitagaki@sacbee.com The modern-day plant shop<\/p>\n

With five decades of presence in East Sacramento, Talini\u2019s is one of the oldest Little Italy Historic District businesses, and the oldest nursery in town, Johnson said.<\/p>\n

Though big-box plant stores and global retailers have threatened to price out small nurseries in the area, Johnson said Talini\u2019s serves a niche purpose for gardeners that has helped protect it.<\/p>\n

\u201cOurr focus is to be unique in the fact that, whatever plants that you need, there may be a different variety that you\u2019re not accustomed to, so it creates a lot of curiosity,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cWe\u2019ve been able to be a little unique in what we bring in and what works in our climate, right.\u201d<\/p>\n

Most, if not all, of the vegetables, fruits, flowers and other starts in the nursery are sourced from California or somewhere in the West Coast. With the earlier-than-usual springtime weather this year, Talini\u2019s was already replete with blossoming tomato starts in late March. One section of the nursery was exclusively heirloom tomato varietals from Wild Boar Farms<\/a> in Citrus Heights.<\/p>\n

Johnson said the nursery also serves the community\u2019s mental health, which was best seen during the COVID-19 pandemic. Talini\u2019s was a rare example during the pandemic \u2014 as a primarily outdoor business selling items for the home, it boomed in popularity in 2020.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn tougher times, people want to be around something that makes them feel good, and I feel like that\u2019s something that we can help with,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cPeople feel good being in their gardens, people feel good planting their own food … It makes people happy, so I feel like there\u2019s a big space for us to continue on.\u201d<\/p>\n

Luciana Johnson does not work in the plant shop \u2014 she is a nurse at Sutter Hospital in Sacramento. Kevin Johnson has a background in business, which helped the family decide he should be part of managing the nursery full-time starting in 2020. The couple also wanted to ensure the business stays in the Talini family as Luigi Talini has gotten older.<\/p>\n

Johnson said his wife is an only child, so it\u2019s up to them to further the Talini\u2019s legacy in Sacramento. The pair hopes their daughters, now aged 14 and 10, are one day interested in carrying the family business for the next 50 years.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis weekend, I had them here moving tomatoes around and stuff,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cThey were all into that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hidden under a plastic planter box holding flower starts in the nursery is a concrete slab imprinted with the Johnson daughters\u2019 handprints, labeled \u201c2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe little things, right?\u201d Johnson said. \u201cFamily\u2019s everything.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A A business sign greets customers at Talini\u2019s Nursery in Sacramento on Tuesday. The nursery was established in 1976 by Pietro Talini, who immigrated from Italy. PAUL KITAGAKI JR. pkitagaki@sacbee.com <\/p>\n

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Camila Pedrosa<\/a><\/p>\n

The Sacramento Bee<\/p>\n

Camila Pedrosa is a service journalism reporter at The Sacramento Bee. She previously worked as a summer reporting intern for The Bee and reported in Phoenix and Washington, D.C. She graduated from Arizona State University with a master\u2019s degree in mass communication.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the cultural background of Sacramento\u2019s Little Italy Historic District has become diluted in recent decades, one small…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":239305,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[107722,107724,121,123,122,107723,107725,107721],"class_list":["post-239304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sacramento","tag-family-owned-plant-shop-sacramento","tag-little-italy-historic-district-sacramento-original-businesses","tag-sacramento","tag-sacramento-headlines","tag-sacramento-news","tag-small-businesses-in-sacramento","tag-small-nursery-plant-shop-sacramento","tag-talinis-nursery-and-garden-center-east-sacramento"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=239304"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239304\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/239305"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=239304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=239304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=239304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}