It should work fine. Perhaps something might have gone astray in your
implementation. Try it again, here's some elaboration on the steps

Select the col headers "A" to "C"
Click Format Conditional Formatting
Under Condition 1, make the settings as:
Formula is:
=AND($A1<"",OR(OFFSET($A1,1,)=$A1,OFFSET($A1,-1,)=$A1))
Click Format button Patterns tab Light brown? OK
Click OK at the main dialog

(Remember that row1 is presumed left empty)
--
Max
Singapore
http://savefile.com/projects/236895
xdemechanik
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wrote in message
ups.com...
This is not working. Do I need to put something in the "" or the <?