Britain's Greggs underlying sales up "double digit" pct in Jan - CEO

LONDON, March 3 (Reuters) - British baker Greggs' like-for-like sales were up by a "double digit" percentage in January before storms in February caused a significant slowdown in trade, its boss said on Tuesday.

"We thought 'wow' this is fantastic (in January) because we were up against very strong figures the year before, but then we got three named storms all one after another," chief executive Roger Whiteside told Reuters.

He said one of the storms flooded a Greggs bakery just outside Cardiff which meant it was unable to supply 40 shops which had to close for a few days.

With regards to coronavirus, Whiteside said his main worry was the potential impact on consumer movement and demand if there was a widespread outbreak across Britain.

"We're in uncharted territory, we'll just have to react accordingly," he said. (Reporting by James Davey, Editing by Paul Sandle)