I have a mysql table which has a column which always uses a ten digit number. This number may be in the following formats: "0011223344" or "1122334400", etc

I used the varchar datatype earlier for this column but since the searches are done using this column, I decided to use either numeric or bigint for this column. But if I change it to bigint or numeric (10,2) - then it removes the starting 0's. For example: "0011223344" becomes "11223344".

However the search for "0011223344" or "11223344" provides the same results.

I would like to use the fastest column type to speed up searches and "0011223344" should display as "0011223344" within mysql.