WINDHAM – The first weekend of the holiday shopping season filled the aisles of Windham stores with shoppers, and many merchants reported an uptick in local residents looking for deals.

The Sebago Lakes Region Chamber of Commerce’s shop-local campaign, which focused on mailing flyers to all Windham households and advertising in local and regional media outlets, seems to be paying off.

“The weekend was good. It was better than last year,” said Bob Mills, owner of the kitchen-goods retailer, Mills and Co., located on Route 302 in the heart of the North Windham shopping district. “The impact of the shop local effort’s really kicked in, so I was pleased because we were able to grow on pretty darn good [2011] figures.”

According to Dan Hancock, chairman of the chamber’s retail committee, which focuses on improving the fortune of local retailers, the shop-local campaign started in earnest about two years ago, in the depths of the recession, as a way to boost sales.

This season, Hancock acquired 100 Small Business Saturday-themed welcome mats from American Express, the credit card issuer. The mats were distributed to many businesses throughout town to welcome shoppers and encourage them to stick to the locally owned retailers, an effort that seems to be paying off, Hancock said.

“It’s been two years of focused effort on this,” Hancock said.

“I’m hearing that generally business is increasing, that local people are supporting local businesses, and we’re moving in the right direction.”

Mills has proof his store is seeing more local customers.

“People really have responded to shopping local. There’s no question. I think it’s been a trend,” Mills said. “We have a loyalty program and I would say the majority of our customers are in that program. So when they buy something we give them bonus points and it goes against their name. So even though I’m not taking a scientific poll, I know as I’m ringing in a sale where the people live, and I would say the vast majority live in the Windham market area.”

Mills isn’t the only business owner seeing more local shoppers. Windham Jewelers, Bull Moose and Sears, each of which reported robust Black Friday and Small Business Saturday sales, are as well.

“It was a decent weekend,” said Bob Yates, owner of Sears North Windham. “The only thing we were lacking was snow. Because normally you’ll sell quite a few snow throwers. But people were buying big-ticket items, quite a few TVs, lot of tools – power tools as well as the hand tools – a lot of tool sets, miter saws, table saws.”

Yates saw many local shoppers, as well and even some coming from the Lewiston-Auburn area, where the Lewiston Sears is in the process of closing.

“We’ve had a half-dozen people or so come over checking us out, since their store is closing, and I imagine that will increase as the store winds down over there,” he said.

Kathleen Wilmot, daughter of Windham Jewelers owner Kathy Byrnes, said their store also had a good weekend.

“Definitely, especially on Saturday, there was a ‘shop local’ feeling with our customers that came in,” Wilmot said. “And yes, we did see a lot of local shoppers. I definitely think that between last year and this year I’ve noticed a focus on shopping local rather than going to the mall, even on Friday. I just think Windham in general, people in this area, tend to stay and support their local community.”

Eric Rossignol, manager at the Bull Moose music store in North Windham, also reported robust sales. The store was open from 6 a.m. to midnight on Black Friday offering sales on limited editions of vinyl releases.

“We have a lot of local people shop here anyway, and we saw a lot of those people,” Rossignol said. “I feel there were a lot of people shopping around, doing the Black Friday thing, but the majority of people I think that shop around this area are local, unless they’re passing through to and from New Hampshire.”

Restaurant sales were decent, as well. Jeff Vermette, owner of the Grateful Bread cafe? and bakery in North Windham, said sales “the two days before Thanksgiving were fabulous. We were about even what we normally do on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.”

Similar to Grateful Bread, Wednesday was busy and the weekend was decent at Rustler’s Steakhouse.

“Friday night was slow. I think everyone got home early and went to bed, but the rest of the weekend was good,” said manager Hayley Osborne. “There was definitely a lot of regular people that we saw. There were a lot of locals.”

The retail activity is especially a good sign, said Hancock and Tom Bartell, Windham’s economic development director. Regarding the direct mailers and advertising aiming to lure locals to shop in Windham for their holiday needs, Bartell said the town and chamber’s main message is: “If you’re going to do shopping, do it here.”

“What we’re trying to do with this effort is just to encourage people to think local first,” Hancock said. “We’re not trying to talk people into spending more money, or spend more money than they planned, but when they do need to make a purchase when they are shopping for gifts, to think of a local business rather than going outside the community because that money does stay here in the community.”

Mills is hoping the trend seen in the first weekend of the holiday shopping season continues for what is an expanded five-weekend season, since Thanksgiving was early this year.

“I hope it’s a good season, we’ll see what happens,” Mills said.

Louise Jensen, an employee at Mills and Co. in North Windham, holds up one of the welcome mats acquired by the Sebago Lakes Region Chamber of Commerce to help promote the chamber’s shop-local campaign. The mats, along with direct mailers to Windham homes and other forms of advertising, apparently worked, as local retailers and restaurants report a strong start to the holiday shopping season.