diff --git a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/font-util/package.py b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/font-util/package.py
index 1401a3b70e7..ec56b078960 100644
--- a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/font-util/package.py
+++ b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/font-util/package.py
@@ -18,6 +18,7 @@ class FontUtil(AutotoolsPackage):
 
     depends_on('bdftopcf', type='build')
     depends_on('mkfontscale', type='build')
+    depends_on('mkfontdir', type='build')
 
     font_baseurl = 'https://www.x.org/archive/individual/font/'
     fonts = []