Why did countries like England, France, and Spain want to establish as many colonies as possible?

In the beginning of the age of discovery, England and France were looking for a new path to get to Asia to trade. But after they found the America’s and the West Indies, colonization for more for power. The more colonies each country could establish, the more power the country would have. A lot of the colonies were also making the home countries lots of money from the fur trade and from cash crops and from the Colombian exchange.