Copying a listing with the variations copied too

I thank you in advance for your help.

I am looking to list some items that have about 10 different colours. I have created one product listing that is now live with these colour variations. I want to use this listing as sort of a template for the other items I want to list for sale. However, when I copy the item, it copies the title and other fields but does not include the colour variations that were originally created in the first product I made a copy from. I have quite a few items I want to create listings from in this way but I don't want to have to create the individual colour variations again for each listing. Is there something I am doing wrong?

I know there is a bulk lister spreadsheet. I tried using this but it was blighted with errors when I tried to upload it from google sheets that I gave up with that method.

I'd be so happy to receive some advice.

Many thanks.