I guess that there is no minimum requirement for the amount of quilting you do to be a quilter. There must be some people out there that quilt once in a blue moon. I don't quilt as much as most, but that doesn't keep me from shopping :) I love batiks, so it not uncommon for me to spend $140 on a throw and that doesn't calculate in anything for machines. I mean throw a couple of Berninas and a Gammill or two in the mix and 3.6 billion sounds like a laughable amount, doesn't it?
I think I may have figured it out...the people who took the survey had to misrepresent the real amount they spent so DH wouldn't find out just what they spent. lol