With a £108,000 Citroen C2 and a £250,000 Cadillac SUV parked outside, it's clear that Phil Leach, MD at car audio experts, SQ+ has been very busy indeed.

Stuart Milne caught up with SQ+'s main man to shoot the breeze about ICE, fires and why his business is the only way he gets to see his wife.

As I arrive at Phil Leach's HQ in Manchester, he's got a phone in one hand and frantically tapping away on his computer with the other.

He looks up and gestures to a seat, but I can't help but check out an impressive looking wall of trophies.

"I've had a virus on my computer, so I've wiped the machine," explains Phil without taking his eyes off the screen.

And it looks like he could do without it at the moment. A quick look around the workshop reveals an almost finished Impreza and a gutted Golf R32. At the back of the unit, Phil's team are busily working on a dinky hatchback which will be appearing at the British Motor Show later this month.

Phil describes SQ+ as a one-stop-shop for your car. His main business is installing quality audio and multimedia systems in cars, but SQ will turn their hands to anything.

"We're about to open a new unit in Kent," he says. "We'll be able to airbrush vehicles as well as train others to do it. We can fit wheels and bodykits; the only thing we won't do is engine work. It's too specialised."

I ask him where it all started. Without answering, he disappears into a side room and returns with a dusty folder.

"I started in this when I met a group of car audio nuts back in 1991. It was the first time I'd ever seen - or heard - high-end audio equipment. I got chatting to one of the guys there, who turned out to own Prestige Audio.

Cuttings

Phil opens the folder and hands it to me, filled with magazine cuttings from all kinds of car magazines.

"Six and a half thousand pounds later, I had my Escort RS Turbo on the covers of magazines and it won virtually every competition it entered."

After a few years working at Prestige Audio in Hertfordshire, Phil moved to Manchester and hooked up with Active Audio.

"We did audio installs for loads of footballers and VIPs, including David Beckham, Ryan Giggs and Andy Cole."

Despite a roll call of Manchester's aristocracy, Phil still has his feet firmly on the ground, and attributes his success to the hours he and wife, Sharon put in.

"She's been so supportive of everything; it's a good job she's here or I'd never see her," he admits.

"I don't have a life outside this. I'm passionate about my job, and I think that's what sets you apart. I walk the dog, and ride my bike, but that's about it."

Millionaire's pad

With the obvious wealth around Manchester, there's no shortage of people with the reddies to splash out on some top notch audio for their homes.

Phil shows me his new demo room. Kitted out like a millionaire's mansion, there's a huge screen on the wall, and an ear-splitting audio system to match.

"Our typical customer will spend around £50,000 on a home cinema system. We'll supply and install the whole thing."

If my six numbers come up on Saturday, I'll be straight up to SQ+ to bag myself a system.

£350,000 garage

Like every other top car audio company, SQ+ has built more cars to demonstrate their talents than most of us will ever own.

Right now, Phil has an awesome £108,000 Citroen C2, complete with Judge Dread-style airbrushing, a centre-mounted steering wheel and driver's seat and enough audio to blow Metallica through a brick wall.

His latest demo is an incredible Cadillac Escalade SUV, complete with monstrous 26-inch wheels, a supercharger and two alternators - one to power the car, and another to power the audio system.

I take a peek inside, and am blown away by the quality of the work. It's got three screens in the dash, eight speakers in each front door and four 15-inch subwoofers in the boot.

Phil pushes a couple of buttons on his remote central locking key fob and a huge drawer full of amplifiers silently slides out of the boot door. Another button pops open the fuel filler cap. This is one cool car.

"It's our demo car, but if you walked in off the street and wanted your Escalade built to this spec, it'd cost you a quarter of a million quid."

I stop leaning on the immaculate black paintwork, and rub off my grubby fingerprints. This is one car I really don't want to damage.

So with a list of stonking demo cars as long as your arm, what was Phil's proudest moment?

"Our first demo car; a Mk2 Golf", Phil says without hesitation. "It ran 150 decibels and was the loudest car in the country at the time. We wanted to build something kids could relate to.

"We put so much into that car, and we had tears in our eyes when the last panel went in. It looked awesome."

Owning a company so committed to car audio, you could be forgiven for thinking Phil's music collection would be packed with bass-heavy CDs.

"I like anything that's been well recorded. I love musical vocals, like James Taylor, Linda Ronstadt, Madonna and Katie Melua".

Hmmm, not what we expected; and neither was his choice of car.

"I'm on my second Lexus IS. I had an IS200, but it was gutless; the IS300 is much better. I belt all over the country and it's beautiful to drive." He sucks through his teeth, mechanic style and sighs: "apart from the £1,000 service I've just had.

"Its becoming more tricked up. It's got five screens and an Alpine and Diamond Audio system and I'm about to fit a set of 19-inch TSW alloys."

So if you happen to see a black Lexus IS200 with big wheels cruising to the dulcet tones of the Queen of Pop, you can bet your life it's Phil.