"We know that people will welcome us back," John Bason told Reuters.

He noted that in Austria, where Primark stores re-opened three weeks ago, like-for-like sales year-on-year were already positive.

Earlier, AB Foods warned it expected to lose sales worth 1.1 billion pounds ($1.6 billion) from the lockdown of Primark stores in its first half to Feb. 27. It expects to lose a further 480 million pounds in its second half.

(Reporting by James Davey; Editing by Kate Holton)