The world has changed in many ways since the coronavirus pandemic struck. Now, you can add end-of-the-year holiday shopping to the list of time-honored traditions being affected. Many retail businesses are launching the holiday shopping season earlier than ever this year. They hope to keep large crowds out of stores and avoid problems when shipping products in November and December. American retail stores like Best Buy, Macy’s, and Target often offer their biggest deals on “Black Friday.” That is the day after the American observance of Thanksgiving in late November. Now, retailers are planning to start offering deals this month. With more people expected to buy products online, retailers are trying to avoid getting a lot of orders in mid-December just before Christmas. That could lead to late gift arrivals and higher shipping costs. Many stores could not keep up with demand when Americans were locked down in their homes during the early days of the pandemic. Online retailer Amazon had to add 175,000 workers to meet demand for products on its website. Black Friday has long been the unofficial start to the holiday season in the United States. However, retailers have been trying to get Americans to start holiday shopping earlier for the past 10 years or so.