The MIN function

The MIN function is a statistical function which returns the smallest numeric value within a dataset. If text or other non-numeric data types are stored within the range they will be omitted from the calculations. TRUE and FALSE arguments are not counted as being numeric values.

This is the format of the MIN function:

=MIN(RANGE 1, RANGE 2, RANGE 3, etc…)

Here is an example of the MIN function:

=MIN(1, 4, 9, TRUE, FALSE, “hello”, 7) = 1

MIN function returning the smallest numeric value from the range

This function is valuable when comparing multiple sets or ranges of data to determine the smallest value available. This could be regarding any field in which you are unlikely to use a single source to determine your results.

An example of a functional implementation of this would be planning to increase your promotional activity in goods products which multiple competitors offer in their assortment. By retrieving the historical prices of a specific good across all retailers who offer it, you can locate the lowest value they sold for, which would be its lowest promotional price. Doing this can give you an idea of how competitive you can allow yourself to be in each product, given your margins.

=MIN(STORE 1 RANGE, STORE 2 RANGE, STORE 3 RANGE)