Writing Style Guide Writing Reference Headlines Where (relative adverb) refers to places and locations. Numbers Phone numbers should be represented in the following format: Internal Content: Capitalize all words in a title or headline except articles (a, an, the) and Where is the station please? The numbers nine and under are always spelled out: four; nine; two (123) 456-7890 prepositions (of, on, to, at, in) 123-456-7890 That’s where I spent my childhood. Exceptions: Exception: Any word that is the first word in the headline or the last word should be Normalization: If you come upon a case where you have two related numbers in the capitalized, regardless of its part of speech Use of “Only” When writing times, always use figures; always show the hour and minutes; use same sentence, you should write them both as numerals if you would write one as a the forms a.m. and p.m.; and skip one space between the final numeral and the numeral. External Content: Southwest prefers a sentence structure in which only the first letter Put the word “only” next to the word or words it modifies. a.m. and p.m. designations: of the first word in a headline or copy should be capitalized The snail advanced 1 inch on the first day and 12 inches on the second day. I’m using only 14 copies. 7:00 a.m.; 11:00 p.m. Exceptions for specific words that can be found in the Alphabetical Listing I’m only using 14 copies. If you have a third number that would normally be written as a word in the example When writing percentages, always use figures, and spell out the word percent: sentence above, and if it isn’t referring to inches, you would still write it out as a word. Italics Sentence Breaks You only normalize to numerals if the numbers are referring to the same thing. 9 percent; 25 percent—unless part of a quote Italicize the names of books, magazines, documents, and newspapers; specific ships Don’t allow the month to be separated from the day or the year when a date comes The five researchers noted that the snail advanced 1 inch on the first day and 12 and aircraft; art forms—plays, paintings, musical compositions; radio and TV shows; and at the end of a line When identifying pages in a book, magazine, etc., always use figures: inches on the second day. foreign words and phrases. Don’t allow the time numeral to be separated from the a.m. or p.m. when a time comes Gary says so, right there on pages 5-12! California One at the end of a line Footnotes Contract of Carriage When writing amounts of money, use figures and decimals for whole-dollar Customer Service Commitment Don’t allow the St. or the Ft. (or the Saint or the Fort) to be separated from the second and fractional amounts: When using footnotes, the footnote number should be placed superscript immediately part when a city’s name comes at the end of a line following the item to which it refers. Italicize the abbreviations e.g. and i.e. And note the definitions of these two foreign $123.72 terms and use them correctly—they are not interchangeable: Don’t allow a formal title to be separated from the rest of the name when a person’s If there is a punctuation mark, the footnote number should be placed immediately name and title come at the end of a line. When referring to a Southwest Airlines flight, capitalize the word Flight and following the punctuation mark (with no space in between the punctuation mark and e.g. is the abbreviation for the Latin exempli gratia: “for example” (or, my simplistic way follow it by one space, the number sign, and the numerical flight number: the footnote number), except for the dash, which the footnote number should precede. of remembering it: for “‘eg’-sample”) Adverbs Flight #5 2 “Wright is Wrong” was the more popular rallying cry. i.e. is the abbreviation for the Latin id est: “that is”; or, “in other words” Avoid excessive adverb use. Rather than enhancing ordinary adjectives with adverbs, Numbers over nine are always in figures: 11; 199; etc. 11 opt for more creative descriptors: The Wright Amendment, which pertained only to Dallas Love Field, was not There are some things that you need for the perfect party; i.e., to make it a conducive to Southwest Airlines’ operation. success. Most of those things are fundamental; e.g., music, food, sodas, and The dog stood tall, his matted fur chocolate against the ocean. Exception: When a number over nine begins the sentence, write it out and hyphenate, if applicable: 3 your little brother’s absence. The dog stood tall, his incredibly dirty fur really brown against the ocean. I will concede—with several reservations —to your proposal. Use italics for emphasis (sparingly). Capitalization Twenty-one Customers boarded that flight. Acronyms/City Codes Exception: Do not spell out the year when it begins a sentence: Follow the normally accepted rules of capitalization; and use capitalization when External communication: Please define acronyms and city codes on first reference. Who, Whose, Whom, That, Which, or Where referring to tangible and intangibles—persons, groups, entities, and qualities—that 2009 was a difficult year for the airline industry. Internal communication: Depending on the audience, defining acronyms and city codes are related to, refer to, or unique to Southwest Airlines: Maintain the above rules even when numbers nine and under and numbers over ten on first reference may or may not be needed. Use who when referring to people or when we want to know the person. are mixed in a sentence: Culture City codes: A city code should only be used when referring to the airport facilities, The person who answered the phone was very helpful. Customers There were only nine gates and 15 planes. operations, and Employees in a particular city. It shouldn’t be used to refer to the Director city itself. Who ate all the chocolates? Employees Spell out simple fractions and use hyphens: Finance Department Generic Singular Pronouns (He/She vs. They/Their) Use which to refer to a thing or an idea, and to ask about choices. Flight Attendant One-fourth of the pies were eaten by two-thirds of the students in only one Leadership and one-half hours. My car, which is 20 years old, isn’t worth much. Reno Station It is now common place to avoid the use of “his/her” or “he/she” when constructing a Shareholder When writing large numbers of four or more digits, use a comma where the comma sentence. You may opt for gender-neutral pronouns such as “their,” “they,” “them.” Which size would you like, small, medium, or large? Team would appear in the figure format: Vision Previous: A Manager should recognize his/her Employees at the Use that for a thing/idea. Warrior Spirit Southwest operates approximately 3,150 flights a day. holiday luncheon. I’m talking about the boot that I saw yesterday. Normally, directions are lower case and spelled out: east; west; southwest Spell out the word “cents” in lowercase and use numerals for amounts less than a dollar. Current: A Manager should recognize their Employees at the holiday luncheon. Use the $ sign and decimal system for larger amounts: This is the style that I want to use. Exceptions: Or if this make you uncomfortable, you can avoid the issue by rewriting the sentence. ‘12 cents’, ‘$1.01.’ Usually this involves simply making the original noun plural. Whose is a possessive pronoun used to refer to ownership. part of an address: N. School Street specific region: the Northeast; West Texas The simplest way to express large numbers is best: The Employees were recognized at the holiday luncheon by their Manager. Whose dictionary is this? Seasons should never be capitalized If Southwest Airlines were to increase its flight turnaround times by even ten Further vs. Farther There’s the girl whose car was stolen. minutes each, we would have to purchase 47 additional aircraft at a cost of He went to school in the fall $46.5 million each. Further is recommended because it can be used a wider variety of situations. When who is the object, whom, with a preposition, can be used instead. If you have He went to school in the Fall Grammatically speaking, both “farther” and “further” can be correct. “Further” can be trouble trying to figure out whether to use who or whom, try rewording the sentence, The following examples apply when using dates: used both literally and figuratively. Beyond the physical distance, it speaks to a higher replacing who or whom with he or him. order benefit. June 1 is my birthday. If you use he, the correct choice is who; if you use him, then whom is the correct choice. June 1, 1955, is my birthdate. You’ll enjoy a better experience with points that go further. I was born in June 1955. The person to whom you are referring no longer works here. I was born on Wednesday, June 1, 1955. “Farther” only connotes physical distance. In some cases, our points do not always take you farther (than other airlines). So saying our rewards take you farther could be incorrect. Writing Style and Trademark Guide Southwest Airlines Brand Style Guide | 120