Your formula actually works for me, but it does have one unneeded set of
parenthesis, I rewrote it as:
=CONCATENATE(COUNTIF(A1:A10,"Item 1")+COUNTIF(A1:A10,"Item 2")," = Total
Items")
and it works also.

As for totals for the award points, use SUMIF. In its simple form for your
example:
=SUMIF(A1:A10,"Item 1",B1:B10)
would give the total of points from column B where "Item 1" is in column A.

To add words, you can use CONCATENATE or not:
=CONCATENATE("Item 1 Points = ", SUMIF(A1:A10,"Item 1",B1:B10))

Hope this gives you a leg up.

"Jas" wrote:

I am trying to get a formula to work but says invalid each time. I am at a
loss.

In Column C, I am using the formula =CONCATENATE((COUNTIF(A1:A10,"Item
1")+COUNTIF(A1:A10,"Item 2"))," = Total Items").
In Column B is the object (reward points for this example) I want to count
against Column C.

In Column A, how do I get the result?

Example:
Item 1 = 20 points
Item 2 = 50 points
I have reward points for every Item I sell.
Result, how many reward points do I get against all Items sold?

So, 6 Item 1s equals 720 points (6x20=720).
How to formulate this please?