Others have mentioned the ways that DOS was good enough or even better for some applications. One of the main strengths of a GUI wasn't being graphical, it was

Others have mentioned the ways that DOS was good enough or even better for some applications. One of the main strengths of a GUI wasn't being graphical, it was that every program had a similar interface. If your work just uses one program, DOS wasn't bad. But remember that the people who use computers aren't the people buying those computers. They're purchased by the boss, and the boss isn't going to spend a single dollar for a better user experience, much less the hundreds or thousands it would have cost. This still applies today to enterprise software.