May 30, 2023 — I had the pleasure of speaking with Nicole Baker, founder of Net Your Problem, a company that recycles end-of-life fishing gear. As a former North Pacific groundfish fisheries observer from 2010 to 2015, Nicole has felt tied to the commercial fishing industry and found herself looking for ways to make the industry greener. During her time as an observer in Dutch Harbor, she became interested in ways of recycling the many worn out fishing nets she came across.
She was first inspired by a nonprofit organization that had collected nets from and illegal fishing operation. Shortly after, that nonprofit began a concept of making shoes with the material. At the time, Nicole had a realization that this netting was made from plastics, and at the end of all net’s lives, landfills were the final destination. She knew where there were just heaps of netting that were no longer useable by fishermen.
This was when the concept for Net Your Problem came to life.