Sorting then grouping

I need to sort a work sheet by first sorting the information by the oldest document date then put all of the same customers together while keeping the oldest document dates on top.

custnum doc date
ide000 8/15/2012
ide000 1/1/2013
ide000 6/1/2013
mik452 8/30/2012
mik452 10/1/2012
mik452 10/11/13


I hope this gives the idea of what I am looking to do.


Maybe a little clarification of what I am needing to do will help get some information. Here is an example of the data I am working from after I do a simple sort...
ide000 8/12/2012
ide000 8/30/2012
mik452 9/6/2013
elo555 9/29/2013
ide000 10/1/2013
mik452 10/5/2013

What I want to end up with is in the first example. Any help is appreciated.

This can be achieved by just using Sort. I don't have 2010, but I imagine it is close to 2007. Go to your Data ribbon and choose sort. A dialog box will come up.
On 'Sort by' choose the custnum column and A to Z. Then hit the button that says 'Add Level'. A new row should be added in the dialog box that says 'Then by'. Choose the doc date column and then 'Smallest to Largest'.

Ok, I tried this and it seems to work (at least on the small amount of data)

I added a helper column C and entered this Array Formula (entered with Ctrl + Shift + Enter) in C2 (data in A2 to B10)

Formula:

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Copy down the length of your data (change the references for the ranges as necessary)
This will pick out the earliest date for each name in column A

Now, do a custom sort. Sort on column C, Old to New.
Then Column A, A to Z.
Then column B, Old to New.

I would suggest a 2-step sort
First sort on date to get the oldest on top
In column C I put a formula for the Ranking of customers
Then sort on Rank + Date + Customer
et voila......

The formula =SMALL(IF($A$2:$A$10=A2,$B$2:$B$10),1) finds the smallest (oldest date) in column B that belongs to each name in column A. This value is constant for each name so, it can be sorted while keeping the names associated with them together.

Then sort on the names and the dates and you end up with a list that has the oldest date with the associate name and all dates sorted in order for that name.

Do one part of the sort at a time in the order given and you will see how the data becomes sorted in the manner you want.