Advice on sorting data/columns

[Mydako]

Hi all, I have a sheet I want to make, but I want to make sure that I'm doing the most efficient way possible.

My company has several thousand products, and each product has maybe 50 associated data points (product weight, package size, colour, stock, sales record etc etc)

I have a nice database I made, but it's not the most user friendly and there are people on my team who still have to check their notes to enter simple formulas like 1+3 in a cell. So I want something more user friendly for them.

What I want is to be able to select which products are displayed, and what data points to include. Select Product 134 and show only the height and country of manufacture for instance.

Is using a Slicer in a Pivot Table the best way to handle this? Or is there something more efficient? I was thinking to select the items, rather than have a list of thousands have cells where people can copy/paste product numbers and then use a vlookup to grab the right data.

The restrictions on making this are that it has to be user friendly, it has to function in Excel 2013, and not using VBA/macros.

Slicer? Or do you have a better recommendation?

Thanks.

 

[Joyner]

Hello, I think you will need to provide a bit more info for better help. There are dozens of ways to do what you want, using formulas, filters, drop down lists, radio buttons, etc, to make things user friendly, but a better understanding of your data layout and what you are thinking for an interface is needed.

 

[Mydako]

Hi, sorry about the delay,

I'm not sure what else to provide. I know there are lots of ways to do it, I just am curious what people think the quickest and most efficient way to do it would be. Just looking for basic ideas on how to accomplish it. Honestly this is more of a thought experiment for a sideproject. If no one has other ideas I can always just tinker on my own.

Currently the worksheet that has all the information on it has 63 columns for just under 16,000 products (and another sheet without about half that much information but not used often). I can navigate this, and I can build tables and lookups for any project I have, but it's not as easy for some people on my team. Each retailer asks for different information, so I'd like something that other people could use to grab only that information.

What I'd like is some way to make a table or sheet that only provides the information someone asks for. Like a series of check boxes to say include "Country of Origin" or how many of the product come on a shipping pallet. Then somewhere that they could enter in the product code.

That might be a bit vague, but I'm not sure what else to say. I can think of a way to try it with slicers, but I'm curious if there are other methods that would be easier or more user friendly.