I am trying to use zip code locations to pull city and state data on each zip code. I downloaded a zip code database but the zip codes are in text format in the database. VLOOKUP formula is correct as far as I can tell -- =VLOOKUP(F2,ZipCode!A:D,3,FALSE) -- but I keep getting "Value is not available to the formula or function" error message (#N/A). I believe the issue is that the zip code database has the zip codes in text rather than number format. So, when I try to pull a value from the database compared to my zip code list (which is in number format), Excel does not read the value.

My question is: how can I convert a column of zip codes in text format to number format?

Thanks.