Thriftly: Merging Sustainability With Technology

Thriftly is a full-stack e-commerce web application designed to modernize and digitize the traditional thrift shopping experience while promoting sustainable and affordable fashion. The platform addresses a critical gap in the current fashion ecosystem by transforming the unorganized, offline second-hand clothing market into a structured, accessible, and user-friendly online marketplace. With increasing awareness of environmental degradation, textile waste, and fast fashion’s harmful impact, Thriftly provides an eco-conscious alternative that encourages reuse, responsible consumption, and sustainable lifestyle choices. The platform offers a complete e-commerce workflow, enabling users to browse thrift products across multiple categories, perform keyword-based searches, add items to favorites, manage a shopping cart, and complete purchases through a secure online payment system. The user interface is built using HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and EJS templates, ensuring dynamic rendering of personalized content such as product listings, cart details, and user preferences. This server-side rendering approach improves performance and maintains consistency across different user sessions. Thriftly is powered by a robust backend developed using Node.js and Express.js, which manages routing, middleware, authentication, and API integrations. The system employs a PostgreSQL relational database to store structured data, including user profiles, product details, cart items, orders, and favorites. The database schema is designed with proper constraints and relationships to ensure data integrity, fast retrieval, and scalability under moderate loads. To enhance security and user convenience, the platform integrates Google OAuth 2.0 for authentication, eliminating the need for traditional password storage. This ensures secure login, session management, and controlled access to protected routes such as cart and order history. For payment processing, Thriftly uses the Razorpay API, enabling real-time and secure online transactions. The payment workflow involves backend-generated orders and frontend checkout handling, ensuring reliability and compliance with standard security practices.