SAN FRANCISCO—On Friday, October 9, the online community radio station BFF.fm began broadcasting from a new satellite studio in the Ferry Building.
Best Frequencies Forever radio station, BFF.fm, is a nonprofit online radio station that has been broadcasting since 2013. The website explains the station has a community-based purpose.
“Each week we produce 105 unique radio programs that introduce you to new sounds, ideas, and, best of all, the people in your neighborhood. So, you can feel less alone and more connected to San Francisco, wherever you happen to be.”
The station has 125 DJs and was co-founded by station manager Amanda Guest and her husband, Forrest Guest, who is the station engineer. Headquarters were previously located in The Secret Alley, a private building in Mission, until staff left in March due to shelter-in-place laws.
Amanda Guest, a Massachusetts native who worked for her school’s station at Salem State University in 1994, told SF Gate she has spent the past six months broadcasting her show from the closet under the front stairs of her apartment.
“It’s the only space in my apartment that has a door that closes and is relatively insulated,” she said.
The station had previously broadcasted using remote software and microphones, using a Zoom call to connect each pair of DJs that were on air together.
According to the San Francisco Examiner, after befriending Ferry Building employees, Amanda Guest came to the business arrangement that brings music to the building’s currently operating outdoor seating area and provides DJs a venue to broadcast from. The Ferry Building’s outdoor booth, which was previously an unoccupied juice bar when the station moved in, has a wide window and sits next to Fort Point Beer Company. It is BFF.fm’s first public booth since 2013, SF Gate reports.
The owner funded the relocation —involving payments for studio insurance and new control surfaces— with a $4,000 kickstarter and by sending out fundraising emails to BFF.fm’s past donors. The money was raised within 48 hours.
Recently, the radio station’s DJs started a mutual aid fund for artists like them who were laid off because of the pandemic, according to the Examiner. BFF.fm also has links to donate to its business and DJs on its website.
