text: There is an airline that does not frown on its customers trying to join the mile high club. In fact, it offers private flights for the express purpose of allowing passengers to have sex in the air. 
   
   That airline is Flamingo Air, and it is located in—of all places—Cincinnati, Ohio. 
   
   As you might expect, the decision to start advertising the chance to join the mile high club began with a bet. President and CEO David MacDonald, who introduces himself as “MacDonald: like ‘Old MacDonald had a farm,’” had owned a large security firm. He sold the company to “go play with airplanes,” and as he explains over a phone call, you’re not in the aviation business very long before the topic of romance comes up. As he sat with a group of buddies discussing the mile high club, his entrepreneurial instincts kicked in. 
   
   “I could sell that!” he told the group. As they all lived on the edge of the Bible Belt in Ohio, his friends protested that the area was too conservative. But MacDonald would not be talked down. 
   
   That was 20 years ago, and MacDonald and Flamingo Air have now helped thousands of couples in straightlaced Ohio join the mile high club. Far from succeeding in spite of the location, MacDonald believes the reason why he has operated “romantic flights” all these years, while other mile high club airlines have come and gone, is that he marketed them with a very Ohioan sensibility. 
   
   *** 
   
   There’s nothing too complicated about running a mile high club airline. For $495, a couple gets a private, hour-long flight. A Flamingo Air pilot sits up front wearing headphones (“He’s busy flying the plane,” MacDonald assures us), while the couple enjoys the back of the plane, where the center row of seats has been removed and replaced with a pile of cushions. 
   
   Flamingo Air operates an average of three romantic flights per week, which makes it a small piece of MacDonald’s business. Flamingo Air originally offered regional charter service, but when those flights became uneconomical, MacDonald switched to offering sightseeing tours and romantic flights. Flamingo Air now also has a flight school and trains aircraft dispatchers and professional drone operators. MacDonald can sound like an ordinary, if unusually cheery, aviation CEO, talking about the potential of drones to deliver cargo and explaining that aircraft dispatchers are the people who plan the details of commercial flights. Business seems good. 
   
   But romantic flights are what David MacDonald is known for, and they’re a hell of a marketing opportunity. When MacDonald talks about Flamingo Air, he does so with the cadence of someone who has told his story to friends and reporters countless times. “This lends itself so well to publicity,” MacDonald tells us, beaming through the phone. “We were even on Letterman!” 
   
   Priceonomics first reported on MacDonald and Flamingo Air in 2013, when Flamingo Air was the only airline in the United States (and one of the only in the world) to offer a chance to join the mile high club. (At least with permission.) Many airlines had tried and failed. 
   
   In MacDonald’s opinion, the reason the others failed was that “they all tried to sell sex, not the sizzle. They all came at it from the mile high club angle, and it didn’t work. You’ve gotta think romance, not sex.” 
   
   This is the surprising secret of mile high club airlines: it has to be marketed as a romantic adventure, not a sultry fantasy. Flamingo Air does not use the term “mile high club” on its website. It describes its flights as “romantic flights” or “flights of fancy.” Challenging our expectation that men would clamor for this, MacDonald says that it is almost always women who calls to book a flight, and they “take it very seriously, and they’re all about the romance.” 
   
   Every flight of fancy includes chocolates and champagne. On Valentine’s Day, demand skyrockets. Flamingo Air has done several weddings in the air (“They weren’t consummated,” MacDonald adds hurriedly. “The priest was in the airplane!”) and 60th anniversaries (“Yes they did, to answer your question!”). 
   
   Whether it’s because Flamingo is located in Cincinnati, or because we overestimate the “sex sells” mantra, MacDonald has found that the key to selling an experience associated with slipping into a tiny lavatory has been to make it classy. Sure, he and the other pilots take a high heel to the back of the head now and again. But their customers “show up and you think they came from the Young Republicans Club,” MacDonald says. “Very straightlaced.” 
   
   Today, in 2016, Flamingo Air has a competitor: Love Cloud in Las Vegas also offers the chance to enter the mile high club. 
   
   Unlike MacDonald, Love Cloud founder Andy Johnson calls a spade a spade. He uses the term “mile high club” on his website, and his slogan is “What happens over Vegas, stays in Vegas.” 
   
   This is the mile high club airline one would imagine: located in Vegas, and attracting customers from Europe, China, Australia, and all over Europe. And yet, much of Johnson’s experience has mirrored MacDonald’s, teaching him to prioritize romance. 
   
   Over the phone, Johnson explains that he expected lots of wealthy men to show up with escorts. But that didn’t happen. Instead, like MacDonald, he got “real couples looking to make an experience they’ve talked about and joked about.” Johnson says that it’s usually women who call to book a flight, and that his customers are not red-blooded twentysomethings but middle aged and elderly couples. He’s done 25th, 30th, and even 50th wedding anniversaries. 
   
   According to Johnson, “What they all say is: ‘We’ll never forget this.’ It’s a bucket list item.” 
   
   Both Johnson and MacDonald have also been surprised to have couples who don’t join the club. One husband and wife who paid for a Flamingo Air flight arrived with a large picnic basket and asked the crew if they could remove the cushions from the back of the plane. “This couple had eight children and just wanted an hour alone without the kids!” MacDonald recalls with a chuckle. “So we took off and they had a nice, quiet time. They were as happy as you could be.” 
   
   A mile high club airline is the kind of thing that makes you say “only in Vegas.” Except it’s also in Ohio. 
   
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   An earlier version of this article was published on August 14, 2013. 
   
   Want to write for Priceonomics? We are looking for freelance contributors. ||||| A private Ohio airline is serving up sex on an airplane, luring customers who yearn to join the “Mile High Club.” 
   
   The “romantic” $425 package includes 60 minutes in heaven aboard a private plane, champagne, chocolate and a “very discreet pilot,” according to the company’s website. 
   
   The Cincinnati-based Flamingo Air says it’s the only one in the country that allows customers to do the dirty deed. 
   
   “I have had a high heel in my ear once, been shot in the back of the head with a champagne cork, and thank God we wear headsets,” Dave MacDonald, pilot and co-owner of the business told WCPO-TV. 
   
   The sexy idea was conjured during a dare between pilot buddies 21 years ago, MacDonald told the station. As many as eight of the fornication flights have been booked in a single day, co-owner Sharon McGee said. 
   
   Sign up for BREAKING NEWS Emails privacy policy Thanks for subscribing! ||||| My boyfriend and I* are getting busy, when I suddenly feel the Earth move. Only this time, the Earth is thousands of feet below us. 
   
   
   
   Our tryst is cut short by some turbulence, and I’m brought back to our less-than-romantic surroundings in the six-passenger cabin of Amelia, a rickety Piper Cherokee 6 aircraft equipped with heart-shaped pillows, plastic champagne flutes, and a polyester blanket. I try to get back in the mood, but I can’t help thinking of what lies behind the thin white curtain just three feet from us: our pilot, Kent Dobbins, an affable, gray-haired man who seems like the “blushing” type. 
   
   
   
   Checking the “Join Mile-High Club” box off my bucket list is supposed to be a fun way for my boyfriend and me to celebrate our anniversary. Although the process of entry might seem straightforward (find willing partner, wait for plane to rise to 5,280 feet, go for it), carrying out these steps can be tricky. The logistics of waiting for the right time—free from turbulence and vigilant flight attendants—can be frustrating in itself. Then there’s the issue of moving within a coffin-size bathroom, not to mention the mandatory (and decidedly unsexy) task of sanitizing the toilet seat. It’s probably why, according to surveys, only four percent of Americans have achieved in-flight intercourse—even though 33 percent fantasize about it. 
   
   
   
   So when I heard about the Ohio-based Flamingo Air’s Flights of Fancy service—60 minutes in the sky, complete with champagne, chocolates, and “one very discreet pilot”—I danced an inner jig at the prospect of finally joining a league of sexual adventurers without facing the typical obstacles. While there are a handful of other private airlines offering similar membership—Erotic Airways in Australia, Mile High Flights in England, and the recently launched Love Cloud in Vegas—Flamingo Air has been letting passengers get frisky in the extra-friendly skies since 1991, servicing two couples per week since its inception. Going with the experienced option, my boyfriend and I fork over the $425 fee and fly to Cincinnati to celebrate our anniversary in truly high style. 
   
   
   
   Captain Dobbins welcomes us aboard the 28-foot jet that will soon become our own personal love nest. Assessing the cramped interior, I quickly realize that there are several degrees of “flying private.” Whereas Kimye might charter the equivalent of the Ritz-Carlton to canoodle between the clouds, we seem to have boarded a sleazy hourly motel room specifically designed for quickies. When Amelia’s engine erupts, several concerns come to mind: Didn’t John F. Kennedy Jr. crash in one of these things? Why does the emergency handle seem so complicated? Should we be troubled that Dobbins wears glasses? 
   
   
   
   As if I need to be reminded of his presence, the pilot’s voice booms from behind the sheet: “Once we cross the river, you can take your seat belts off, if you know what I mean. That’s the last you’ll hear from me,” he says. “Unless there’s an emergency, obviously.” The only thing to do is pop open the $4.99 bottle of André Brut and get comfortable. The glowing sunset, combined with the liquid courage of the bubbly, reminds me of our mission. We spot the river. “Let’s get naked,” I announce. 
   
   
   
   Stripping seductively in tight quarters isn’t an option, but the teamwork required serves as effective foreplay. Or so I tell myself. Honestly, I’m less turned on than focused on the task at hand: Must achieve high-altitude orgasm. 
   
   
   
   When my boyfriend beckons me to kneel before him, I smile coyly while searching for a comfortable position on a floor that vibrates with disconcerting intensity. I jump on him, and we start to get into the groove—until my elbow takes a massive hit from the turbulence. Then I see the river again, our signal that it’s time to wrap things up. I reapply myself as quickly as possible until I reach my goal. “Yes!” I shout, no longer caring about our chaperone in the cockpit. 
   
   
   
   After we land, we’re greeted by owners David MacDonald and Sharon McGee, who present us with a certificate: “This is to certify that Mélanie Berliet performed the prescribed ritual and became eligible for membership in this exclusive club.” 
   
   
   
   Some might argue that my boyfriend and I took the easy way out, bypassing the old-fashioned way of joining the Mile-High Club. That Flamingo Air cheats the system by offering a watered-down version of the fantasy that removes the illicit thrill of getting caught. But our adventure wasn’t without its hurdles, and I’ll take the freedom to howl with abandon over the rush of getting away with the act on a crowded plane any day. 
   
   
   
   *Models pictured in photo are not the author and her boyfriend. 
   
   Photos by Miles Aldridge / Trunk Archive
target: – Most people board a plane with the goal of going somewhere. Not on Flamingo Air, unless an orgasm counts as a destination. The Cincinnati-based airline's goal is for fliers to fulfill their dream of having sex in the sky. President and CEO David MacDonald once owned a large security firm, reports Priceonomics. Then one day 20 years ago, he was discussing the mile high club with friends and he got the idea to create an airline to help people have sex. Today, he says thousands of surprisingly "straight-laced" couples have paid for private, hour-long "flights of fancy" on Flamingo—which also offers sightseeing tours and has a flight school—for a $495 fee. They've included a couple celebrating their 60th wedding anniversary and a pair with eight kids who simply wanted some time to themselves. No need to maneuver around airplane seats: couples are treated to a pile of cushions where two seats should be, plus chocolates and champagne. As MacDonald puts it, "you've gotta think romance, not sex." That's why similar airlines have failed, he says—though the Love Cloud does offer "mile high club" flights in Las Vegas. "They all tried to sell sex, not the sizzle." That doesn’t mean the flight isn't awkward. The space is cramped, there's turbulence to worry about, and the pilot is only hidden behind a curtain, Melanie Berliet wrote for Maxim in 2014. "I have had a high heel in my ear once, been shot in the back of the head with a champagne cork," MacDonald, also a pilot, previously admitted, per the New York Daily News. "Thank God we wear headsets." (These celebs say they're in the mile high club.)