Sequentially Numbered Labels

If you work in a business where you need to sequentially number items, you might be wondering if there is a way you can use Word to create the labels for you. Word has many ways you can implement some type of numbering in your documents. For instance, you can use different fields for numbering, or use numbered lists, the captioning feature, or you can use mail merging. While all of these features (and more) use some type of numbering in them, they are not all well suited to creating labels.

Perhaps the easiest way to set up labels that have sequential numbers is to use the Envelopes and Labels capability of Word in concert with the SEQ field. Simply follow these steps:

1. Use the Envelopes and Labels option from the Tools menu to create a sheet of blank labels.
2. In the top-left label, type the word Exhibit, followed by a space.
3. Choose Field from the Insert menu. Word displays the Field dialog box.
4. In the Categories list, choose Numbering. (Click here to see a related figure.)
5. In the Field Names list, choose Seq. The letters SEQ should appear in the Field Codes box at the bottom of the dialog box.
6. Click on the Field Codes box and make sure the insertion pointer appears at the end of the field. (The only thing to the left of the insertion mark should be SEQ and a space.)
7. Type a name for this sequence of numbers, such as "exhibit" (without the quote marks).
8. Click on OK. A number appears in your document.
9. Format the contents of this first label any way you desire.
10. Copy the first label by selecting it and pressing Ctrl+C.
11. Select each of the other labels in the first row in turn, and press Ctrl+V. You should now have a complete row of the labels.
12. Select the other, blank rows of labels and delete them.
13. Select the entire first row of labels and press Ctrl+C.
14. Press the right arrow, which should place your insertion point immediately after (beneath) the first row of labels.
15. Press Ctrl+V to paste a new row of labels. You should now have two rows of labels, correctly formatted. (Don't worry yet that they have the same numbers on them.)
16. Press Ctrl+V for each additional row of labels you want. You want enough rows of labels to meet your entire needs. Thus, if you need a total of 125 labels, and you can get 3 labels per line, you should end up with 42 rows of labels.
17. Press Ctrl+A to select everything in the document.
18. Press F9. This updates all the fields in what you selected. All your numbering should now be correct.

If, for some reason, all the numbers in your labels are still the same number, it means that you inserted an additional switch in the SEQ field in steps 1 through 8. If this is the case, start over, but after step 8 examine the contents of the created SEQ field (by selecting it and pressing Shift+F9). The field should only look like this:

{ SEQ exhibit }

If the field looks differently, then edit it and press Shift+F9 to again display the field results. Now you can continue with the rest of the steps to finish out your labels.

If you prefer to not use the SEQ field to create the labels, you can also create them doing a mail merge. Conceptually, you only need to do the following:

1. Create an Excel worksheet that has as many numbers in it as you need. For instance, if you need 175 labels, you would place a title in cell A1 (such as "Number") and the 175 numbers you need in cells A2 through A176. Make sure you save the workbook.
2. In Word, choose Mail Merge from the Tools menu. This displays the Mail Merge Helper dialog box.
3. Go through the steps of creating a new document consisting of labels and specifying your data source (the worksheet you created in step 1).
4. Create the sample label so that it has the word Exhibit followed by a merge field that represents the number being pulled from the Excel worksheet. Make sure the label contents are formatted the way you need them.
5. Merge the information to a new document. You should now have a document that has all your labels in it, and you can print them as desired.

Of course, there are third-party solutions that are available for creating sequentially numbered labels. One that comes highly recommended by several WordTips subscribers is Bates Labels from Payne Consulting (http://www.payneconsulting.com). This free Word template allows you to easily create as many labels as you need for a specific purpose.