Charlotte- explain your NC license plates to me

This is a silly question--but I moved here two months ago from Milwaukee and a couple weeks ago I made the switcheroo to NC license plates. The thing I don't get is this: the start of my plates are AKX.... and ANYTIME I drive ANYWHERE I see roughly 5-10 people with plates that also start with AKX. Seriously... whats with that? I never saw anyone with similar license plate letters when I lived in Wisconsin. Are license plates organized by cities or counties or something? How am I seeing sooooo many AKX plates?