Coronavirus: Find out why the boss of Yours Clothing says there will not be any redundancies

The jobs pledge from Andrew Killingsworth, the founder of Yours Clothing, in Bakewell Road, Orton Southgate, comes as the omni-channel, plus size fashion retailer looks at ways to tackle the impact of the infectious Covid-19 which is keeping shoppers out of many high street stores.

He said: "This is a strong business. It is very resilient and in very good shape and we don't have any debt.

"We have the funds and the support to see this through, whether it takes three, four or six months.

"There will not be any redundancies. We will absolutely see this through."

However, Mr Killingsworth said the fall out from the coronavirus was having a big impact on the business, which has about 300 agency and full-time staff at its head office and distribution centre.

It has meant that a number of agency staff have been released with some full-time staff at the head office and distribution centre to be laid off for four weeks during April - a move which will involve about 100 people.

Mr Killingsworth said: "Sales at our stores have trickled down to almost nothing."

The company has about 170 stores across the UK, including a Yours Clothing branch and a separate outlet for its men's brand, BadRhino, both in Bridge Street, Peterborough. In total the stores employ about 900 staff.

"We are not sending any more stock to our stores for the time being and we have paused some orders."

Trading hours at its stores have been reduced from 9am to 10pm to 10am to 4pm Monday to Saturday with no Sunday openings.

Mr Killingsworth said the position would be reviewed on Monday when a decision may be taken to shut stores for one month.

He said sales through the websites - the company has 14 websites shipping clothes to more than 90 countries - were doing extremely well but online sales only accounted for 40 per cent of the business.

Yours Clothing has also seen its stores in Germany closed due to decisions by the German government as it also looks to tackle the Covid-19 outbreak.

The coronavirus crisis has cost a dark shadow over Yours Clothing, which just two months ago celebrated one of its strongest years on the back of a record Christmas trading.

It was also ranked as the East of England's top firm for its fast growing exports.

Mr Killingsworth said: "No one created this crisis and no one wants it.

"I am upset for all the people who worked for me.

"We are planning for an economic bounce back when this is over and our intention is to welcome them all back after the four week layoff."