Roughly 30% of American adults own firearms with almost half of American households having at least one gun in it.
Of these approximate 80 million people, about 20% (16 million) buy hunting licenses and 6% (about 5 million) are National Rifle Association members.
The NRA has less than 100,000 classified shooters (less than 2% of their membership.) Name alphabet soup organizations like USPSA (United States Practical Shooting Association) and IDPA (International Defensive Pistol Association) top out at around 20,000 members each. ATA (Amateur Trapshooting Association) is the oldest and biggest discipline-specific organization at around 55,000. SASS (Single Action Shooting Society) has about the same number of members but many of them don’t participate as competitive shooters. If we’re generous, we might estimate perhaps 250,000 competitive shooters in the United States in all disciplines.
Less than this attend tactical training or shooting schools of any kind. Gunsite/American Pistol Institute boasts 75,000 total students and they’re the original and oldest, starting back in 1975. For all the noise, most schools are smaller. Many trainers don’t have their own facilities and are actually one individual or a small group of instructors with a website and an Internet following and hosting classes for a handful of people at a time at other ranges.
Let’s grossly over estimate and assume this works out to about one million semi-active shooter-competitor-trainees/trainers-whatever; people that seek out and attend at least a couple organized shooting events or classes each year. There are 80 million gun owners and 40 million handgun owners in the U.S.
Competition vs. tactical vs. hunting vs. anything isn’t the problem. Getting tens of millions of gun owners involved in something – anything– is.
Firearm User Network 
Jun 05, 2014 @ 12:51:24
And they all need to read our books. Now wouldn’t that be nice?
High ammo and travel costs are one thing, finding time for a new activity is another. Getting people to change their priorities is no small thing. Either a sense of importance of the activity or some sort of reward is needed, preferably both.
Importance? Become more proficient at defending self and family, or at hitting your deer.
Reward? Bragging rights, recognition among your peers, a shiny prize, whatever.
The activity would have to be fun, relevant to some practical use, and not too intimidating/expensive to try. Also be heavily advertised in every possible venue where the likely market exists from TV down to the local sporting goods store.
None of this is insurmountable, but it would take a very large grass-roots effort across the country.
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Jun 06, 2014 @ 16:50:10
As usual, you make good points. I wish I had The Solution but thought pointing out some of the numbers might be useful.
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Jun 06, 2014 @ 23:29:12
Appleseed is making some headway, but still not enough. However those who have taken the training form the nucleus of a pool of potential participants….
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Jun 09, 2014 @ 23:03:32
I watched a TED talk the other day about bicycling, and why it seems so difficult to get people involved in doing it. The argument essentially came down to the way governments have promoted helmet laws, and other “safety” laws. The general populace has begun to think that riding bicycles as a means of transportation is increasingly dangerous. When, in fact, it is far safer than automobiles from a statistical standpoint.
I think the shooting community is dealing with a similar problem. It’s not so much a safety issue (everyone is, hopefully, aware that firearms and other weapons are dangerous when misused), but a perception issue. It is difficult to generate mass appeal when the face of your activity is dominated by a relative few caricatures. These groups with the loudest voices drive away anyone who might have a modicum of interest, but don’t want to be associated with “those” people.
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