Although settlers harvested raw materials such as timber and attempted industries such as glassblowing and potash production, the colony was hard pressed to generate a profit. The Virginia Company of London, which had organized and financed colonization, was pleased when colonist John Rolfe’s experimental tobacco station proved a success.
By 1614, colonist Ralph Hamor would report, “…I doubt not [we] will make and return such Tobacco this year, that even England shall acknowledge the goodness thereof.”