100th Anniversary of the Austrian Federal Railway

Austria Post occasionally produces some unique and gimmicky postage stamps: stamps decorated or made from non-conventional materials for example. Some of them are very impractical and were clearly not designed to ever be used as postage. 

This stamp from 2023 commemorates the 100th anniversary of the Austrian Federal Railways (ÖBB). Here is what's unique about it. It's made from recycled acrylic, laser cut into the shape of a stamp. The stamp part has a peel and stick adhesive backing. Beneath the backing is an NFC chip that can be scanned to obtain a link to some augmented reality animation. And the blue label part at the bottom can be separated from the stamp and it has a magnet attached to the back. It's a weak magnet but it does hold both stamp and label to the side of my refrigerator. 

The label below each stamp has the name of an ÖBB station. Every station is represented and there 1031 stations in the Austrian rail system which means there are 1031 variations of this stamp (of 181655 stamps produced). On my stamps is "St Georgen am Steinfelde" : a small town an hours drive west of Vienna, just south of St. Pölten.

I bought mine with a little folder that has some extra info about the stamp. The surfaces were protected with a plastic film which I removed. I don't necessarily have an interest in trains, or Austrian stamps. I just thought it was an interesting curiosity.