This Ugly Website Makes $700 Million a Year
And refused an $11 billion offer
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Business loves to overcomplicate itself.
Everyone’s chasing the “next big thing,” usually with a combo of no code editors, cheesy marketing, some sort of AI integration, and features nobody asked for.
And then there’s this website born in 1995, and it looks like it hasn’t been updated since then (and probably hasn’t much).
No shiny branding. No sleek UI. Just blue links, gray background, and categories that feel like someone typed them out in a hurry and never bothered to change them.
Yet, this website dinosaur makes over $700 million a year.
Proof that the idea is key, not the design, not the marketing.
We’ve lost that type of thinking…
The website we’re talking about is Craigslist.
No Glow Up
Craigslist is one of a kind.
It shows that “good enough” can actually be great.
It’s not pretty. It’s not cool. It just… works.
You want to sell your couch? Done. Looking for a used bike? Easy. Need a job or an apartment? It’s all there.
No logins, no pushy upgrades, no “sign up for our premium pro-plus-gold experience.”
Just a barebones site that solves a problem.
It’s almost insulting how effective it is compared to the countless “modern” classifieds apps and services.
Entrepreneurs Can’t Help Themselves
They can’t stop adding stuff. I know this from experience.
They launch with a clear, useful product. Then they start tinkering. One feature here, another “growth hack” there. Soon, the product is bloated and overcomplicated: a little bit of everything, but nothing you’d actually want.
Craigslist…
It stuck to the basics.
It didn’t care about being trendy. It cared about being useful. That’s why it’s still standing while a dozen “Craigslist killers” are gone.
Simple Wins
It isn’t luck. It’s discipline that wins.
Clarity: Everyone knows what Craigslist does. You don’t need a landing page explainer video.
Consistency: It hasn’t suddenly rebranded itself as a “community-powered lifestyle hub.” It’s the same service every time you show up.
Trust: It’s stable, people trust it. Even if it looks like Windows 95.
And those three things beat fancy design nine times out of ten.
Simplicity Takes Guts
People confuse simple with lazy. It’s not.
Keeping something simple is hard.
It means saying no to shiny trends. It means ignoring investors who want more features just to justify a higher valuation. It means focusing on what people actually need.
And it might mean, saying no to a boatload of money offers. $11 billion in this case.
No Reinventing the Wheel
Not every business needs a revolution.
You don’t need to turn the wheel into a hexagon because “disruption.” Sometimes you just need to roll the wheel forward.
Most customers don’t care about innovation. Just continuity and improvement.
They care about whether your thing works.
If it solves their problem simply and reliably, they’ll come back. If it doesn’t, no amount of neon branding or clever slogans will save you.
The Bottom Line
Craigslist is proof that you don’t always have to evolve (a lot).
Sometimes the smartest move in business is to stop overthinking it.
Solve the problem. Make it easy. Deliver consistently. Stay.
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First I thought 700 USD is not much... But then I saw you forgot million in your headline.
OMG thank you for this reminder Burk. Few of my peers and mentors who I look up to have very basic websites. The products and services deliver above and beyond. And they are exceptional humans too!