diff --git a/buildtools.sh b/buildtools.sh
index fc188c4..afbc9f0 100755
--- a/buildtools.sh
+++ b/buildtools.sh
@@ -1,6 +1,8 @@
 #!/bin/sh
 cd `dirname $0`
-UTILITIES=`pwd`
+if [ -z "$UTILITIES" ]; then
+	UTILITIES=`pwd`
+fi
 git clean -x -d -f $UTILITIES
 echo -n Building development tools...
 GOBIN="$UTILITIES/bin" GOPATH="$UTILITIES/third_party:$UTILITIES" go get -d jehanne/cmd/...