[Feature Request]: Add a Shopping Cart with persistent state — products added to cart should survive page refresh

[prince-pokharna]

Summary

Brownie Bliss is a bakery/food e-commerce project. If the site has a product listing or ordering capability, the shopping cart state should persist across page refreshes. Currently, if a user adds items to the cart and refreshes the page (or navigates away and returns), the cart is empty — this is a critical e-commerce UX failure.

Problem

• Cart state is held only in React component state (or context), which is lost on every page reload.
• Users who add items and then pause to read descriptions or navigate to another page lose their selections entirely.
• For a food ordering platform, losing cart state mid-session is a direct conversion killer.
• No localStorage persistence or session-based cart storage appears to be implemented.

Impact

• Cart abandonment increases dramatically when users cannot trust that their selections will be remembered.
• Multi-page browsing (product detail → cart → product detail) becomes frustrating as the cart empties on each navigation.

Proposed Solution

1. Create a CartContext using React Context + useReducer for cart state management.
2. Persist to localStorage on every cart state change using a useEffect:

   useEffect(() => {
     localStorage.setItem('brownie-cart', JSON.stringify(cartState));
   }, [cartState]);

3. Rehydrate from localStorage on app initialization:

   const initialState = JSON.parse(localStorage.getItem('brownie-cart') || '[]');

4. Add cart item count badge to the cart icon in the Navbar so users always know their cart status.
5. Add a cart expiry (e.g., 24 hours) to automatically clear stale carts.

Additional Notes

• I will implement the CartContext, persistence logic, Navbar badge, and a basic cart summary page.
• Could you assign this to me?

Labels: enhancement, feature, ui/ux, good first issue, GSSoC 2026

[prince-pokharna]

Hey @adithyan-css ,
Please assign it to me under GSSoC 2026.
/assign /claim /claim-assignment