Additional info:
If there may be text in the sum range, then try these ARRAY FORMULAS
(committed with Ctrl+Shift+Enter, instead of just Enter):

Using my previous post's example....
The Ford total
G1: =SUMPRODUCT(($A$2:$A$9=J1)*IF(ISNUMBER($B$2:$H$9), $B$2:$H$9))

or....the non "deleted" total
=SUMPRODUCT(($A$2:$A$9<"deleted")*IF(ISNUMBER($B$ 2:$H$9),$B$2:$H$9))

Does that help?
***********
Regards,
Ron

XL2003, WinXP


"Ron Coderre" wrote:

With your posted table of information in cells A1:H9

This formula returns the total values for Ford
F1: Ford
G1: =SUMPRODUCT(($A$2:$A$9=J1)*$B$2:$H$9)

OR...if you want the total of all rows that do not begin with "delted"
G1: =SUMPRODUCT(($A$2:$A$9<"deleted")*$B$2:$H$9)

Is that something you can work with?

(Post back if you have more questions.)
***********
Regards,
Ron

XL2003, WinXP


" wrote:

I have had a good look through the posts but haven't found a problem
quite like this, though I am sure it has come up before.

Are you able to obtain a single result for the following problem.

For each car manufacturer, sum all the months of data, excluding the
comment columns, for any row that does not contain the phrase
deleted. But I don't want to use a pivot table or VBA.

May June JulyComments Comments Aug Sep
ford 12 1 101 102 87
ford 168 2 102 87 16
chrysler 44 5 105 74 31
chrysler 54 3 118 166 18
deleted 73 7 147 518 35
deleted 89 9 198 2 68
ferrari 28 5 187 87 18
ferrari 46 1 185 89 82

My problem is how to sum the row without the columns in the middle
which cannot be moved. And how to search and sum row by row without
using VBA.

thanks in advance