On Christmas Eve, Maine-ly New Hampshire planned on closing at 4 p.m. But the Portsmouth gift store with locally made goods was so busy that the staff decided to stay open.

At 7:30 p.m., a man came in searching frantically for a child’s gift, owner Deborah Bouchard-Smith said in a press release. She showed him Firewood Toys made of wood in New Hampshire. He was so happy with the old-fashioned toys that he bought the tractor, sailboat and the train, and got them gift-wrapped.
Experiences like these are one reason why, despite challenging economic conditions, independent retailers outperformed many chain stores during the holiday season, according to a national survey.

The survey of 1,142 independent retailers nationwide found that holiday sales at independent stores declined an average of 5 percent from the same period in 2007. While not great news, that compares favorably to most competing chains. Sales at Barnes & Noble declined 7.7 percent, Best Buy was down 6.5 percent, Borders was down 14 percent, JC Penney was down 8.1 percent, Macy’s was down 7.5 percent, The Gap was down 14 percent and Williams-Sonoma was down 24.2 percent. The Commerce Department recently reported that December retail sales overall were down 9.8 percent from December 2007.

The survey also found that independent retailers in communities with active Buy Local campaigns—like the Seacoast—reported much stronger holiday sales than those in communities without such campaigns. Dozens of areas have launched buy local campaigns over the last few years. Independent retailers in these communities reported an average drop in sales of 3.2 percent, compared to a steeper decline of 5.6 percent for those in cities without an active initiative.

The survey was conducted by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, a nonprofit research organization, in partnership with several independent business organizations. A similar survey last year yielded comparable results.

“During this holiday season, many more customers mentioned their intentional shopping at local businesses,” said Beth Simpson, owner of Rolling Green Nursery in Greenland, in a press release. Ninety-five percent of the retailers surveyed said the fact that their business is locally owned matters to their customers, up from 82 percent in the previous year’s survey.

Stacy Mitchell, senior researcher with the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, which conducted the study, said that even as household budgets shrink, many people are choosing to direct more of their spending to local businesses. This could be a key factor in getting the economy back on track, she said, since locally owned businesses deliver more jobs and greater economic benefits to their communities.