Primark rocks as young mums flock to stores post lockdown

THE High Street is back, and Londoners love it, says Primark chief John Bason.

There has been roaring trade in Primark’s re-opened stores in the last three days, with the flagship store on Oxford Street only topped by Charlton for footfall.

In the week rivals Debenhams and TopShop fell into serious disarray, Primark, owned by sugar producer ABF, offered hope for the offline retail trade.

ABF finance director John Bason told the Standard: “We are back, the high street is back. Trading has been phenomenal. People want the experience.”

He was talking as ABF’s annual general meeting began today. Losses for the last three months are put at £450 million due to store closures, even worse than the £375 million pencilled in.

That is a good indicator of the strife in retail, which Primark can absorb but others cannot.

While Primark agrees that it needs other stores on the high street to survive, it is an unlikely buyer of distressed assets in the UK.

It said: “We may look at one or two locations but the focus of our expansion is in the US and on the continent. We have stores in nearly all the locations we need in the UK.”

Bason says young mums in particular have been flocking to do late night shopping in stores, some of which have been open 24 hours a day since Wednesday.

He said: “We want a strong high street, but we can’t get away from the fact that it is changing, but not in one direction only. We want a social, thriving place.”

Susannah Streeter at Hargreaves Lansdown said:

‘’The cost of the latest lockdown was the final nail to hammer ABF’s competitor Arcadia group, pushing it into administration. So it comes as little surprise that the Primark owner now says the forced shuttering of stores was an even bigger hit to sales than first forecast, now putting the price at £430 million. Remarkably, despite this sizeable hole in revenues, ABF still expects to profits to reach higher levels than last year.  At a time when rivals on the high street like Top Shop, Debenhams and Bonmarche face being wound up or sold, Primark is proving highly resilient.”

Primark has pointedly avoided sales via the web, insisting its low-cost offer is viable only if people come to stores and, in effect, pay their own transport costs.

ABF shares rose 48p to 2351p, which values the business at towards £19 billion.