Jingle: “Southern is going your way” (1973)
“Going your way” may just be the most overused airline slogan out there — Mohawk used it, Braniff used it, Air Botswana uses it today, and Northwest Orient turned it on its head (“The world is going our way.”) It’s a pretty inoffensive little tagline, and it’s fitting that Southern turned it into a pretty inoffensive little jingle.
In fact, although this jingle has a grand total of five words, it comes in six versions: the one above, and the five below.
Everything about this jingle is economical—and no wonder, since Southern had, as recently as 1968, been America’s smallest certified carrier. The tagline is vague enough that it could be used for any spot, whether the subject be routes, fares, or the in-flight meals. And it certainly saves money to record six versions at once.
In fact, my suspicion is that these jingles were used mostly for radio, possibly for spots produced by the radio stations or even as a bed for live reads. They have identical structures:
- The tagline, sung
- A donut (an instrumental break allowing a voiceover)
- The tagline, sung again from 18 to 22 seconds
- Another donut (“And now, when you book tickets on Southern through your travel agent…”)
- The tagline, sung one last time at the end
The structure between the versions is so similar that you could use the same script (and, if it’s prerecorded, the same voiceover) and simply send the version of the jingle appropriate to the radio station’s format (“Contemporary” for adult contemporary stations, “Good music” for beautiful music, etc.)
I have no way of knowing for sure that that is indeed what they did, but it would make sense. It would be a very economical way of handling a high volume of retail advertising.
Airline: Southern Airways
Title: “Southern is going your way”
Agency: Harris & Weinstein, Atlanta
Written By: Larry Muhoberac
Year: 1973
Lyrics:
Southern is going your way.
Donut
Southern is going your way.
Donut
Southern is going your way!