BATON ROUGE - Black Friday is here and it is bigger, earlier, and more complicated than ever. Shoppers are lining up for bargains, but the biggest sale of the year is no longer confined to a single day. Retailers are stretching deals across weeks, even months, to catch buyers early.

“It’s the official start to the holiday shopping season,” said Dan Rice, an associate professor of marketing at LSU.

The holiday shopping marathon now stretches from Black Friday to Cyber Monday. For consumers, this means more time to shop but also more decisions to make.

“It’s really the big day that people mark as the start not only to the season but also to what we sometimes call Cyber Week, which ends with Cyber Monday,” Rice said.

Expect a mix of deals this year. Prices may vary depending on where item

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