Charge storage in organics has been a dream for many years. In part because organics offer advantages in terms of processing, sourcing of starting materials, and a high degree of tailorability. The first part of the talk, will cover recent advances in using conductive polymers to enhance performance of classical battery chemistries. This is followed by our recent work using catechols as the charge storing unit, specifically using blended and co-polymer techniques. A major part of the talk will be devoted to the challenges and methods of characterizing the charged and discharged state of these new charge storage systems.