Romance On The Road

Feb. 11, 2008 Special to ABCNEWS.com — -- Business trips aren't all flight delays, meals on the go and cranky road warriors.

Unattached business travelers know that when the meetings end and the hotel bars open, lonely business travelers are up for lingering over a meal with a stranger. And while flight delays are frustrating, it's when they pile up that single business travelers and their like get friendly--frisky, even.

Road warriors try to make the best of a bad situation, says Bill Humphrey, who travels at least 150,000 miles per year for work (and stays in 180 hotel rooms annually!) as a sales manager for a relocation company near Philadelphia. While waiting on the tarmac before takeoff out of Amsterdam, he chatted with a flight attendant who was being battered by unhappy passengers. Since weather ultimately caused the flight to be canceled, Humphrey and the other passengers headed to the airport Sheraton for a drink. A few of the flight attendants joined them at the bar.

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The one he chatted with on the plane turned to him and said, "Oh, you must really fly a lot." Then she said, "I'm alone tonight--why don't we make the most of it?"

"I told her, 'I'm very flattered, and you're pretty, but I'm happily married,'" says Humphrey. "It was flattering. She had to be 10 years younger than me, and I had to be 20 pounds heavier than I should be."

It's a common occurrence; in a recent survey, hotel chain Holiday Inn tried to get a handle on just how common. They learned that 41% of business travelers have been "picked up or hit on before noon." Related to that, 44% said someone they didn't know had asked to sit with them for breakfast while they were traveling for work.

Sometimes it turns into more than just a meal. Barbara de Nijs Bik was at her industry's annual trade show in Dallas in 1997 when she met the man who would become her husband. On the last night of the conference, there was a gala, and all attendees wore tuxedos and cocktail dresses. A colleague approached her and said she had just met a cute guy that she wanted to introduce her to.