This is hundreds of thousands to a few million folks.
.22 LR is a cheap "plinking round". It's a great training round for the masses and even the military used it when real war ammo was in great demand. .22 LR is often a beginner gun. My kids, my wife, myself and my Dad all began shooting with .22's.
I really think ammo manufacturers underestimated public demand and ignored the huge surge in gun purchases that the left claimed was just a few folks buying a lot of guns-hoarding. They ignored the changing demographics (women are the fastest growing demographic of new gun owners) as well as the production numbers of guns.
Even today, before I fire my center fire pistols/revolvers, I'll often warm up with a couple of hundred rounds of .22LR and more when the kids are with me.
