Input for ways of structuring a data-set - unsure of what tools to use

[BrandtJaco]

Hey you guys! - I need your bright excel minds for some help/inspiration with some data structuring in excel!

The specific task at hand is:

Create a tool where the team is able to filter by city and select multiple dealers. All the relevant listings should appear in a way that is easy to print. The information needed is the Uniqueid, the dealer, model, brand, year, price and colour for each listing. The same tool should be used each week, the only thing changing is the relevant data.

All of the different categories (Unique ID, model, price etc.) are already provided in columns in a data sheet.

What i have done so far is to convert it into a table where you can filter all categories by one or multiple (e.g. "Select all" or one at a time) and then structure your data that way.

I think a pivot table makes little sense as no calculations are needed? Plus many of the columns only contain text, such as "new/used" or brand names. There are no columns that represent sales volume or other KPI's that would make sense to accumulate in a pivot. What do you think? I normal table structure where you can filter, just the way to go?

I'm not that confident in excel so i would love some suggestions to where to go from here.

(I use Excel 10)

 

[Smitty]

Welcome to the Board!

If you were in Excel 2013+ you could use Slicers on your table, but since they're not available in 2010 a Pivot Table might be the best way to go. As far a only using a Pivot Table for calculations, nothing could be farther from the truth: you can use them to give users the ability to do what they want with regards to displaying data without giving them the ability to FUBAR it. Just put all of your data points in the Rows section and you can create an almost exact duplicate of your table data.

And once you try Slicers you (and your users) will never want to go back!

HTH,

 

[BrandtJaco]

Welcome to the Board!

Just put all of your data points in the Rows section and you can create an almost exact duplicate of your table data.

And once you try Slicers you (and your users) will never want to go back!

HTH,

Hey Smitty!

Thank you, it's good to be here!

Thanks for the awesome feedback. The forum sure doesn't disappoint!

I am actually using Excel 2013 and the slicer function is indeed awesome. I still want to add a pivot table tho, if the sheet were to be used by someone who is not working in Excel 2013.

I am trying to "duplicate" the table structure (like you said), but so that it only contains the relevant sections (UniqueID, Year etc. - The same as those stated above). But they all seem to appear in Column A, grouped together under each other. Making me unable to filter them properly?

How would i go about structuring it the way you suggested?

Thank you!

 

[BrandtJaco]

I am trying to "duplicate" the table structure (like you said), but so that it only contains the relevant sections (UniqueID, Year etc. - The same as those stated above). But they all seem to appear in Column A, grouped together under each other. Making me unable to filter them properly?

I managed to solve this one myself. This can be easily solved by selecting "Show in Tabular form" under report layout and then just adding data to the rows section.

Thank you for the help!

 

[Smitty]

This can be easily solved by selecting "Show in Tabular form" under report layout and then just adding data to the rows section.

Sorry, I should have mentioned that the default layout isn't all that user friendly.