Please help with mail merge converting a numbers sheet to a pages based printed directory for a non-profit. Assuming that I am not the first one out there with this issue. I am looking to print on regular size paper landscape style and folded and stapled in the middle. Has anyone already done this?
[Re-Titled by Moderator]
You can get started by following the information in the Pages User Guide for Mac for merge steps via the following:
Add, change, or delete a merge field in Pages on Mac - Apple Support
Populate and create customized documents in Pages on Mac - Apple Support
The version of Pages and Numbers should be the same.
I have no need to perform Mail merge so won't directly provide any further coaching. You may get lucky and have someone help you through the process, though this isn't really the place for that detailed interaction.
I looked for and did not find any YouTube video newer than 2022 that does Mail Merge with Pages and Numbers. I wanted something newer as Pages and Numbers have changed in the three elapsed years.
I don't think Mail Merge is what you want/need here.
Mail Merge lets you create a template document/layout and connect it to a table of data (typically names and addresses, but can technically be anything). The 'table' can come from either your Contacts database a Numbers spreadsheet.
Pages then replicates the template for each entry in the source data.
What this means is if you have 200 names in your contact spreadsheet, you will end up with a 200-page document with one person's contact details on each page. That doesn't sound like a directory to me.
from the description, it sounds like the only complex part here is the 'folded and stapled' component.
On that basis, assuming the spreadsheet has all the data you want, this should get you going:
The last phase - importing the data - is a two-step process because Pages can't (or, at least, won't) open a Numbers spreadsheet directly, so you have to create a dummy table, then copy your data in, so...
3. Create a table in Pages with the relevant number of columns (the row count is irrelevant at this point). For example, if your directory has Last Name, First Name, ID number, you want three columns:
4. Now go to Numbers, and select the columns of data you want to include in the directory (click the column header to select the entire column.
5. Copy the data from Numbers
6. Select the first cell in the table in Pages, then Paste the data.
(Note that Pages reacts differently depending on whether the cell is selected or active (i.e. you can type into it). If it's active (it has a blinking insertion point) then all the spreadsheet data will be pasted into that one cell. That's not what you want, so click away, then reselect the cell by clicking it once).
Pages will expand the table to accommodate all the rows of data copied from the spreadsheet. You can now format this however you want, with styles, headers, color, etc.
The magic comes when you try to print the directory. In the Print dialog, scroll down to the Layout section. Expand this and set the Pages per Sheet to 'Print As Booklet':
Pages will now scale the pages down to fit a half-page, and will reorder the pages such that when printed double-sided, collated, and folded, the pages will be in order.
The important parts here is that when you're editing the document, think of what you want each page to look like, (ignoring the fact that multiple pages will be printed per sheet), and let the Print dialog do the heavy lifting.
How do I create a printed directory from a Numbers sheet using Pages for a non-profit?
