Adding categories in Excel with SUMIF

If you need to get the SUM of only specific items within a column in Excel, the SUMIF function will make things simple.

 

In this spreadsheet example, each specific type of fruit can be totaled separately. 
To total all the apples,  =SUMIF(B2:B8,"apple",C2:C8)
The word apple must be in quotes for the function to work.
To calculate the total bananas and oranges sold, simply change "apple" to "banana" or "orange" in your SUMIF function.  See example images below