Penneys announce plans to reopen stores in Castlebar and Ballina

Penneys has announced plans to reopen all of its stores in Ireland from June 12 under Phase 2 of the lifting of Covid-19 restrictions.

In a statement, it said that its stores with street access will open next Friday and that on June 15 its stores located in shopping centres will reopen. 

The retailer said that stores will open with measures in place to safeguard customers and employees. 

These include limiting the number of customers in its stores to enable social distancing, as well as closing every second till to allow more space between customers and employees.

Hand sanitiser stations will be made available and Perspex screens will also be installed.

Primark CEO Paul Merchant said: "We will adopt all government safety advice as a minimum in our stores and have benefited from our experience in the other markets in Europe where we have already opened successfully.

"As we open, we will continue to look at best practice across the retail sector and amend our measures appropriately."