New Zealand
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Why we don't make our school book covers from PVC — and why our food-grade, recyclable plastic is a genuinely better choice for kids, classrooms and the planet.
For decades, the cheapest way to cover a school exercise book was a roll of soft, shiny PVC contact. Even today, you can buy cheap imported book covers made of PVC. The thing is, PVC is also one of the worst materials we could put into a child's hands for hours a day. We made EZ Covers to give schools a real alternative - covers that are tough enough to last for years, kind enough to live with for hours every day, and recyclable when they finally do retire.
What is PVC, and why is it a problem?
Polyvinyl chloride — PVC, or "vinyl" — is one of the most widely used plastics on the planet. It is also one of the most widely criticised. The European Environment Agency, Greenpeace and a long list of public-health bodies have flagged PVC as a material of concern at every stage of its life: when it is made, while it is in use, and at the end of its life when it is burned or buried.
Soft, flexible PVC — the kind used in cling-style book covering — is rarely "just" PVC. To make rigid vinyl bend and stretch, manufacturers add plasticisers, often from the phthalate family. They are not chemically bonded to the plastic, which means they slowly migrate out: onto fingers, into dust, into the air of a closed school bag.
The short version
PVC is cheap to make and difficult to recycle. The chemicals that make it soft and shiny do not stay locked inside the plastic for life. Children handle their books every single day — that is not where we want a question mark to be.
Three reasons we do not use it
Health concerns for kids
Phthalates and other PVC additives have been linked in peer-reviewed research to hormone disruption and respiratory irritation. Children's hands are on their exercise books for hours a week. Let's not roll the dice on our kids health.
A heavy environmental footprint
PVC production releases chlorine-based pollutants. When PVC is incinerated at end-of-life it can release dioxins — some of the most persistent organic pollutants we know of. PVC is also notoriously hard to recycle: most kerbside programmes will not accept it, so it ends up in landfill.
There are better alternatives!
Plastics that are safe hands and recyclable may be more expensive to produce, but they're protecting our kids and the environment. So that's what we use!
Why our food-grade plastic is different
EZ Covers are made from a thin, tough, food-grade LDPE film — the same family of plastics certified safe for direct contact with food. No PVC. No phthalate plasticisers. No BPA. Just a clean, flexible material that has been tested for the kind of daily handling a primary-school book takes.
Food-grade safe
Certified for direct food contact — no phthalates, no BPA, no surprises.
Reusable, year after year
Slip one off a finished book and straight onto the next. One cover, many books.
Soft-plastics recyclable
When a cover finally retires, it goes with your soft-plastic recycling - not landfill.
Proudly NZ made
Designed, sewn and shipped from Auckland. Short supply chain, real accountability.
What this means for your school
A classroom that switches to EZ Covers stops sending PVC offcuts and used vinyl to landfill every January. It also gives children a covering experience that takes seconds and a cover that genuinely lasts. We have schools whose covers are still in active rotation after five years of use — that is the standard we hold ourselves to.
If you are a teacher, a parent, or a school office manager weighing up your options for next year, we would love to send you a sample. The difference between a soft PVC roll and an EZ Cover in your hand is not subtle.