Any Excel experts? Need help with a drop down issue

Hopefully someone here can help me with this problem. I'm building a pricing spreadsheet for one of our products that has a bunch of options. The goal is to make it idiot proof so the inside sales people can actually price it correctly. I have the basic framework done, and I have dropdown lists for the options. What I can't figure out is how to assign a numerical value to the text listed in the dropdowns. I have a second worksheet set up in the book that has lists of the optional items (name in first column, price in the second) and that is the data I am using to create the dropdowns. Now how do I tie the value column to the text description? It seems like "VLOOKUP" should do it, but I can't get the formula written without getting an error.

Anyone out there able to help?

 

usual vlookup error are blank spaces, but since you are referencing a list, that shouldn't be the issue...

vlookup should be the answer:

=vlookup(referenced cell, the range of the list with text/identifier in first column, column # (probably 2 from your description), false)

I hope this is along the right path, or if this is not the issue, let me/us know, and I'll see if I can help further