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NILES — Cold yet sunny weather proved to be a winning combination for Small Business Saturday, which took over downtown Niles this past weekend.

Hosted annually the Saturday after Thanksgiving, SBS is a day where small businesses nationwide are celebrated and promoted by their communities.

Local businesses worked to make their business a destination, offering specials, entertainment and refreshments.

“Thank you to everybody that came downtown to Small Business Saturday,” said Lisa Croteau, director of marketing and administrator for Niles Main Street. “It was very, very successful. We have one business, Apothica Teas, that reported over a public tease. Let them about 200 percent (sales increase) for the day. (Owner Laura Hollister) said she had lots of people that had never been in there before and most of the other businesses kind of followed suit. It was a really wonderful day.”

Mayor Nick Shelton echoed Croteau’s statement.

“Saturday was a huge success,” he said. “My family and I went down there and we went all over. It was awesome; I’m very grateful for (Croteau) and your leadership in that effort and very thankful to all of our volunteers. Justin Flagel, he’s a superhero. He was there all day leading the charge and it was awesome to see.”

With SBS in the rear view, the DDA will turn its attention to its upcoming Winter Market Crawl set from noon to 4 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 11. Businesses throughout downtown will have vendors in their location that guests will be able to “crawl” through downtown, perusing local vendors and experiencing what downtown Niles has to offer.