Excel for small business owners

For owners who run the numbers themselves, usually at night, in one spreadsheet that has grown for years. Excel answers the questions that decide whether the business works: which products actually make money, what to charge, how many sales cover the rent, and whether there is enough cash in the bank in February. Every formula below runs on a real sales log you can edit.

Shop and studio owners
Makers selling online and at markets
Service businesses
Bookkeepers helping owners

Sample data

Every result on this page comes from this sheet, calculated by the same engine the Cellwise app uses. Change a number and watch the formulas react.

	A	B	C	D	E	F	G	H
1	Date	Product	Units	Price	Unit cost	Orders	Nov fixed costs	2400
2	Oct 4, 2026	Soy candle	14	24	7.8	11	Card fee rate	0.029
3	Oct 11, 2026	Gift box	6	58	26.5	6	Target margin	0.65
4	Oct 18, 2026	Candle workshop	8	45	12	3
5	Oct 25, 2026	Bar soap	30	9	2.6	17
6	Nov 1, 2026	Soy candle	22	24	7.8	16
7	Nov 2, 2026	Bar soap	41	9	2.6	23
8	Nov 8, 2026	Gift box	11	58	26.5	10
9	Nov 15, 2026	Candle workshop	10	45	12	4
10	Nov 15, 2026	Soy candle	18	24	7.8	13
11	Nov 22, 2026	Gift box	15	58	26.5	14
12	Nov 29, 2026	Bar soap	26	9	2.6	15

What Excel does for small business

Total one month of sales from a running log

Most owners keep one long sales log rather than a sheet per month. That is the right call, but it means every monthly number needs a formula that picks out the right rows. Revenue is units times price, so multiply the two columns row by row and keep only November.

SUMPRODUCT does all three in one go: (MONTH(A2:A12)=11) is 1 for November rows and 0 for the rest, so October rows drop out. If your log covers more than one year, add (YEAR(A2:A12)=2026) as another factor, or November 2025 sales sneak in.

=SUMPRODUCT((MONTH(A2:A12)=11)*C2:C12*D2:D12)

Result: 3521

$3,521 of sales in November, from the seven November rows. The four October rows are ignored.

See which product really makes money

Revenue flatters expensive products. Gift boxes bring in the most money here, but each one costs $26.50 to make. What you keep is gross profit: units times (price minus unit cost). Work it out per product before you decide what to push, discount or drop.

Swap the product name to compare. Put the names in a small list and point the formula at that cell instead of typing the name, and you have a profit-by-product table you can copy down.

=SUMPRODUCT((B2:B12="Gift box")*C2:C12*(D2:D12-E2:E12))

Result: 1008

$1,008 gross profit from 32 gift boxes. Soy candles make almost as much ($875) on half the sales dollars, because they keep 67.5% of the price against 54% for gift boxes.

Price for the margin you want (not cost plus a percent)

The most common pricing mistake: adding 65% to the cost and expecting a 65% margin. Margin is profit as a share of the price, so cost times 1.65 gives a margin of only 39%. To get a target margin, divide the cost by (1 minus the margin).

H3 holds the target margin, so you can try 50%, 60% or 70% and see the price move. Round the result to a price that looks deliberate, like 22.50 or 23.

=ROUND(E2/(1-H3),2)

Result: 22.29

A $7.80 candle needs a price of $22.29 for a 65% margin. The current $24 price clears it, with a margin of 67.5%.

Work out how many sales cover your fixed costs

Fixed costs (rent, software, insurance, your own base pay) arrive whether you sell anything or not. Each sale contributes its price minus its unit cost toward them. Divide the fixed costs by that contribution and you get the break-even number of units.

Always round up, because you cannot sell 148.1 candles, and 148 would leave you a little short. ROUNDUP with 0 decimals does that.

=ROUNDUP(H1/(D2-E2),0)

Result: 149

149 soy candles a month cover $2,400 of fixed costs ($16.20 contribution each). November sold 40, so the other products have to carry the rest.

Find net profit after fees and fixed costs

Gross profit is not what lands in your pocket. Card fees take a slice of every sale and fixed costs come off the top. Put the fee rate in a cell (H2 here; use the rate on your own processor statement) so the formula keeps working when it changes.

The formula below takes November gross profit, subtracts card fees on November sales, then subtracts the month's fixed costs.

=ROUND(SUMPRODUCT((MONTH(A2:A12)=11)*C2:C12*(D2:D12-E2:E12))-H2*SUMPRODUCT((MONTH(A2:A12)=11)*C2:C12*D2:D12)-H1,2)

Result: -276.31

-$276.31: November gross profit of $2,225.80, minus $102.11 in card fees, minus $2,400 of fixed costs. A busy-looking month that still lost money.

Track average order value and customer counts

Revenue grows two ways: more orders, or bigger ones. Average order value (AOV) is revenue divided by the number of orders. Watch it next to the order count: a bundle or a free-shipping threshold should push AOV up, while a sale usually brings more orders at a lower AOV.

Here the November orders come from SUMIFS with two date conditions, which is the most reliable way to filter a date range.

=ROUND(SUMPRODUCT((MONTH(A2:A12)=11)*C2:C12*D2:D12)/SUMIFS(F2:F12,A2:A12,">="&DATE(2026,11,1),A2:A12,"<"&DATE(2026,12,1)),2)

Result: 37.06

$37.06 per order: $3,521 of November sales across 95 orders.

Compare this month with last month

Month-over-month change tells you whether things are moving the right way. New divided by old, minus 1, gives the change as a percentage. Format the cell as a percentage and a positive number means growth.

One month is noisy, especially for seasonal businesses. Compare November with last November too, once you have a year of data.

=SUMPRODUCT((MONTH(A2:A12)=11)*C2:C12*D2:D12)/SUMPRODUCT((MONTH(A2:A12)=10)*C2:C12*D2:D12)-1

Result: 1.6796042618 shows as 168% with Percent format

November sales were 168% higher than October ($3,521 against $1,314), helped by holiday gift buying.

Practice: 8 exercises

Use the sample data above. Type a formula and press Check: it is graded by a real spreadsheet engine, the way Cellwise grades lessons.

1How many bars of soap were sold in total?

Your formula for exercise 1

Show answer
=SUMIF(B2:B12,"Bar soap",C2:C12) = 97. SUMIF adds the Units only on rows where the product is Bar soap: 30 + 41 + 26.
2What was the total revenue from gift boxes?

Your formula for exercise 2

Show answer
=SUMPRODUCT((B2:B12="Gift box")*C2:C12*D2:D12) = 1856. The test is 1 on Gift box rows and 0 elsewhere, so only those rows add units times price.
3How many orders came in during November?

Your formula for exercise 3

Show answer
=SUMIFS(F2:F12,A2:A12,">="&DATE(2026,11,1),A2:A12,"<"&DATE(2026,12,1)) = 95. Using "before December 1" instead of "on or before November 30" keeps working if your dates ever carry a time.
4What was the total gross profit across every row?

Your formula for exercise 4

Show answer
=SUMPRODUCT(C2:C12,D2:D12-E2:E12) = 3097.6. SUMPRODUCT multiplies each row's units by its profit per unit and adds the results.
5What is the overall gross margin, as a share of revenue?

Your formula for exercise 5

Show answer
=SUMPRODUCT(C2:C12,D2:D12-E2:E12)/SUMPRODUCT(C2:C12,D2:D12) = 0.64066184074. Margin is always profit divided by price (or revenue), never by cost.
6How many soy candle entries sold more than 15 units?

Your formula for exercise 6

Show answer
=COUNTIFS(B2:B12,"Soy candle",C2:C12,">15") = 2. Both conditions must be true on the same row, so only the entries with 22 and 18 units count.
7How many soy candles must sell to cover the November fixed costs in H1? Round up.

Your formula for exercise 7

Show answer
=ROUNDUP(H1/(D2-E2),0) = 149. Each candle contributes $16.20, so 2,400 / 16.20 = 148.1, which rounds up to 149.
8What price gives bar soap (unit cost in E5) the target margin in H3? Round up to the next 50 cents.

Your formula for exercise 8

Show answer
=ROUNDUP(E5/(1-H3)*2,0)/2 = 7.5. 2.60 / 0.35 = 7.43, and rounding up to the next half dollar gives 7.50. The current $9 price is comfortably above it.

Free templates for small business

Guided project: Product profit report

Turn a product list into a report that shows what each product earns, the best one, and whether profit covers the fixed costs.

6 steps in the Cellwise app. Each step checks your formula in a real grid, with hints when you get stuck. Part of Cellwise Plus.

Open guided projects

Guides for these formulas

FAQ

What Excel formulas does a small business owner need most?

SUMIFS to total sales by month or product, SUMPRODUCT for units times price, IF for flags like "reorder" or "overdue", XLOOKUP or INDEX and MATCH to pull prices, and ROUND so money adds up to the cent. Those cover most day-to-day reports.

How do I calculate profit margin in Excel?

Divide profit by revenue: =(price-cost)/price for one product, or total profit divided by total revenue for the business. Format the cell as a percentage. Dividing by cost gives markup, a different and larger number.

Should I use Excel or accounting software for my small business?

Use accounting software (or a bookkeeper) for the official books, invoices and tax records. Excel is better for the questions those tools answer poorly: which product to push, what to charge, what-if cash forecasts and break-even. Many owners export from their accounting tool into Excel for exactly that.

How do I calculate break-even in Excel?

Divide fixed costs by the contribution per sale (price minus variable cost per unit) and round up: =ROUNDUP(fixed/(price-unit_cost),0). That is the number of units you need to sell to cover fixed costs before making a profit.

Excel for other fields

Updated November 2, 2026