In a few weeks (or days, depending how early you get into the festive mood), we are about to enter an unprecedented holiday season.

Many longstanding traditions will either be altered or nixed completely as the pandemic persists. Many will be rethinking holiday travel and limiting holiday gatherings to a smaller size. Large-scale retailers are rethinking Black Friday events, and communities are cancelling in-person events altogether. Even Macy’s announced it won’t have a Santa in its New York City store, the first time in its 160-year history.

In many ways, the holiday season will look different this year — and how people are shopping this season is already looking different, too.

Holiday shopping has already begun, kicking off much earlier this year. As COVID-19 cases surge across the United States and European countries enter another shutdown, it is easy to wonder what comes next as we grapple with containing the virus’s spread. Will we be able to shop in person? Will we feel comfortable shopping in person?

Retailers both locally and across the country have already faced limitations on the inventory they have been able to get, as supply chains have been disrupted by the pandemic. As trips get canceled and people spend more time at home, consumers are looking at different ways to spend their money and time, resulting in items like bikes, kayaks, patio heaters, fitness equipment, pools, and home technology unable to be kept in stock.

The pandemic has accelerated the boom of e-commerce, especially when placing online orders for pick-up or delivery has remained a safe option to shop for both essential and non-essential items.

According to research by Mastercard, when stay-at-home-orders were in their peak in April and May this year, more money was spent online than the last 12 Cyber Mondays combined.

Even though businesses have been able to reopen to in-person shopping, online shopping is here to stay. According to an article published by Forbes on e-commerce, between November and January of this year, e-commerce holiday retail sales are expected to grow between 25% and 35%, reaching $182 billion to $196 billion in total.

Preparing for that additional holiday surge, Amazon and UPS have both already announced plans to each fill 100,000 seasonal job openings at their companies in preparation for the holiday “shipmageddon.”

So what does that mean for brick-and-mortar retailers?

The concerns surrounding the upcoming holiday season — how to limit large numbers of customers in a confined space, how to contend with e-commerce, delays in shipping times, and limited inventory availability — certainly are in the minds of smaller, brick-and-mortar retailers, too.

In our own community, some have been lucky to be on track with a normal year after this summer and fall. For many, the holiday season is one of their busiest of the year. A slow holiday season before the other winter months would be irreversibly detrimental going into 2021.

Often, e-commerce and brick-and-mortar are posited as diametrically opposed: only one can thrive while the other declines. What we often forget is that e-commerce is a valuable tool that can extend one’s market and connect a business to customers beyond their physical location. With the convenience of e-commerce, brick-and-mortars can supplement their in-person experience with holiday shopping options that allow the customer to shop safely and conveniently at home.

“Click-and-mortar” is no longer an option for many businesses. It’s necessary to survive.

For those of us lucky to live in an area that has small retailers and brick-and-mortar businesses, it is important now more than ever to support them during these next few months. Whether you are shopping online or in-person this holiday season, try to show our locally owned, small retailers and businesses some love this holiday season — and consider shopping, and shipping, early.

Anne Gentry graduated from Brown University with a degree in comparative literature and has studied in Italy and South Australia. She is currently executive director of the Alpena Downtown Development Authority.