diff --git a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/mercury/package.py b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/mercury/package.py
index 62097000cea..b09256b7ad5 100644
--- a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/mercury/package.py
+++ b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/mercury/package.py
@@ -39,6 +39,8 @@ class Mercury(CMakePackage):
     #   Cray-MPICH if libfabric and MPI are used at the same time
     variant('udreg', default=False,
             description='Enable udreg on supported Cray platforms')
+    variant('verbose', default=True,
+            description='Enable Mercury to print errors on stderr')
 
     depends_on('cmake@2.8.12.2:', type='build')
     # depends_on('cci', when='+cci')  # TODO: add CCI package
@@ -77,6 +79,7 @@ def cmake_args(self):
             '-DNA_USE_CCI:BOOL=%s' % variant_bool('+cci'),
             '-DNA_USE_MPI:BOOL=%s' % variant_bool('+mpi'),
             '-DNA_USE_SM:BOOL=%s'  % variant_bool('+sm'),
+            '-DMERCURY_ENABLE_VERBOSE_ERROR=%s' % variant_bool('+verbose'),
         ]
 
         if '@1.0.0:' in spec: