Perhaps a better question:

Again, I can not use the monthly column headings as a reference for
extraction

Why can't you use the column headers to find the data you're looking for?

--
Biff
Microsoft Excel MVP


"smartin" wrote in message
...
Morton Detwyler wrote:
I have rows of product data with monthly column headings. Each month, new
data is added. I already have the current month number, but need to
extract the previous month's number but can not use the monthly headings
as a reference. If I have the number "57" for Prod 3, from Nov. 08, what
formula can be used to find the number "12" also from Prod 3, from Oct.
08. Again, I can not use the monthly column headings as a reference for
extraction. Thanks much for the help!

Aug 08 Sep 08 Oct 08 Nov 08
Prod 1 14 16 9 17
Prod 2 23 42 37 14
Prod 3 37 16 12 57


Question for you: how do you know which column the Nov 08 result came
from?