Q&A: George Weston, chief executive of Primark owner ABF

Retail Week: How are customers behaving at the moment?

George Weston: “We think they’re shopping more carefully. They’re buying only what they went into the store to find.

“The trend on basics is well down. People are wearing basic clothing for longer. Fashion, if it’s attractive and right, is still selling well. People are attracted to clothes that make a bigger statement than perhaps before.”

You reported that stores in Europe, including Eurozone countries, exceeded expectations. That might surprise people. What do you put it down to?

“In the traditional business in Ireland we’ve seen a satisfying recovery from the very difficult days of a few years ago.

“Spain of course has terrible economic difficulties but in Germany the consumer is confident and has more money.

“This is a business that does well in good times and bad. It speaks to the strength of Primark’s fashion offer.”

Your stores are doing well but do you think in future they might need to be complemented by an online or multichannel offer?

“We do talk about it constantly. At the moment we don’t think we’re seeing sales lost to online. We’re very busy opening stores in the UK and overseas.

“You make your choices about where you put your effort. We have the second Oxford Street [store], an extensive refurb of Manchester and a bigger shop in Newcastle [all planned].

“For the time being it’s about the physical network. Whether in future we say now’s the time to trade online, who knows.”

What has been the effect of taking cotton price rises on the chin rather than passing them on to the consumer?

“We’ve seen very strong sales growth. It hasn’t translated into profit because we’ve been absorbing it [the price increase]. Cotton prices have fallen and we hope to have an improvement in margin.”

You’re opening a 400,000 sq ft depot in Germany to service stores. What difference will that make to the business?

“It will supply Benelux as well as Germany. It will take a lot of trucks off the road. It will reduce the cost of distribution and stores will be able to get hold of the range earlier.”