MLA Business Member Spotlight: Waterfront Solutions of New England

John Ricker likes what he does. As founder of Waterfront Solutions of New England Marine Construction and a former Kittery lobsterman, he knows the value of a well-constructed wharf or dock. “It’s nice to see something that you’ve built last,” he said. “If we do our job right and build it right, you know it is going to last.”

Ricker went lobstering when he was younger but got out of the fishery in the mid-1990s. “I fished inshore from Kittery and offshore from Portsmouth, N.H. and Newport, Rhode Island,” he said. “My dad is still fishing out of Portsmouth and he’s 78. He was supposed to retire at 75 but then he said he thought he’d go for another five years or so. He just keeps going.”

After finishing lobstering, Ricker spent time down in Florida where he got into the marine construction business. “I went to work with a guy down there and eventually ventured out on my own,” he said. After 23 years building piers, docks, wharves, boat houses, and seawalls along the East Coast and the Caribbean, Ricker, a Portsmouth native, decided it was time, as he put it, to “come home.”

He has been on the road a lot since the devastating storms that battered the Maine coast this past January. “We’ve had a bunch of calls since then. We’ve hired more crew and we have a new crane on one of the barges,” Ricker said. “We are able to take on whatever needs to be done.”

Joining the MLA as a business member just seemed to make sense to Ricker. He understands the fishery and the needs of wharf owners and lobstermen. “I just wanted to give a little something back to the industry,” he said. When it comes to marine construction projects, however, Ricker is very clear about his priorities. “Commercial guys have precedence over residential work. That’s how they make a living.”

Waterfront Solutions of New England

10 Lund Drive

Strafford, NH 03884

603-380-8817

https://waterfrontsolutionsne.com