Bureo NetPlus is a reliable material made from old fishing nets

Bureo NetPlus isn’t a specific product. It’s a recycled nylon material made from discarded and repurposed fishing nets. That removes plastic from our oceans, repurposes a material that would contribute to more waste, and reduces the environmental impact of an end-of-life product.

While it’s not a specific product that you can buy — over 35 well-known brands use this sustainable material — Bureo’s NetPlus is a high-performance, high-impact fabric material made with recycled nylon out of old fishing nets. Manufacturers can weave the finished material into a wide range of fabrics and similar materials for outdoor activities, including cold, wet, and sunny weather conditions.

The skateboard shown in the featured image, Carver’s The Ahi, is a performance board made with NetPlus materials as the deck.

Through Bureo, fishermen return their end-of-life nets through an incentivized recycling program. This keeps them out of the oceans, out of waste dumps and landfills and reuses the material for good. The nets are then sorted, cleaned, and shredded before being packed at Bureo facilities. They’re then shipped to recycling plants and through a process called advanced depolymerization, they’re broken down into nylon pellets. The NetPlus nylon pellets are extruded into high-quality yarn spools, like spools of thread. Then partner brands and manufacturers take those spools and weave them into fabrics and clothing.

The NetPlus material and supply line is fully transparent and traceable. Fishing nets are tracked from their original source all the way through the recycling and manufacturing stages. Brands and consumers alike have full assurance the products contain 100% post-consumer recycled fishing net materials — they get peace of mind they’re supporting a green, sustainable brand.

That sounds wonderful, but what is the material used for?

What brands actually use the Bureo NetPlus material?

Over 35 “forward-thinking” brands use the NetPlus material in products. You can see the full list at Bureo’s partners page, if you’re interested. But there are some pretty big names that use and support this technology. Bass Pro Shops, Jenga, Trek, L.L. Bean, REI Co-op, Eddie Bauer, Rivian, Quiksilver, YETI, Patagonia, Costa, and Silvini are just some of the brands.

Perhaps more exciting is what kind of products the material is used to create. Hats, sunglasses, jackets, bags, shirts, shorts, pants, surfboard fins, frisbees, board games, skateboards, you name it. Bureo has collected and recycled over 15 million pounds of discarded fishing nets since 2013. Believe it or not, fishing nets are some of the most harmful forms of ocean plastic pollution, with up to 8.8 million tons of plastic waste entering our oceans annually. It’s impressive and commendable that Bureo is contributing to so much of that plastic staying out of the ocean and being repurposed. Moreover, a preliminary LCA study suggests NetPlus nylon manufacturing offers reductions in GHG, fossil fuels, energy consumption and water usage compared to virgin nylon.

So, if you want to do your part? Simply shop some of the brands that use NetPlus and show your support.