diff --git a/Dockerfile b/Dockerfile
index 3953a27..20cfc8d 100644
--- a/Dockerfile
+++ b/Dockerfile
@@ -9,6 +9,7 @@ ARG PROJECT_REF=master
 ARG DISTRO
 ARG PROFILES
 ARG PIP_PACKAGES=""
+ARG DIST_PACKAGES=""
 ARG PLUGIN=no
 ARG PYTHON3=no
 
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 1cc3966..b14e6fb 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -71,9 +71,12 @@ For more advanced building you can use docker build arguments to define:
     base image.
   * `PROFILES` The bindep profiles to specify to configure which packages get
     installed. This is a space sperated list.
-  * `PIP_PACKAGES` Specify additional packages you would like installed. The
-    only caveat is these packages must exist in your WHEELS tarball. So if you
-    wanted to include rpdb, you would need to have built that into your WHEELS.
+  * `PIP_PACKAGES` Specify additional python packages you would like installed.
+    The only caveat is these packages must exist in WHEELS form. So if
+    you wanted to include rpdb, you would need to have built that into your
+    WHEELS.
+  * `DIST_PACKAGES` Specify additional distribution packages you would like
+    installed.
 
 This makes it really easy to integrate LOCI images into your development or
 CI/CD workflow, for example, if you wanted to build an image from [this
diff --git a/scripts/install_packages.sh b/scripts/install_packages.sh
index 2b54be7..bc50b8a 100755
--- a/scripts/install_packages.sh
+++ b/scripts/install_packages.sh
@@ -11,10 +11,10 @@ PACKAGES=($(bindep -f /opt/loci/bindep.txt -b -l newline ${PROJECT} ${PROFILES}
 if [[ ! -z ${PACKAGES} ]]; then
     case ${distro} in
         debian|ubuntu)
-            apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends ${PACKAGES[@]}
+            apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends ${PACKAGES[@]} ${DIST_PACKAGES}
             ;;
         centos)
-            yum -y --setopt=skip_missing_names_on_install=False install ${PACKAGES[@]}
+            yum -y --setopt=skip_missing_names_on_install=False install ${PACKAGES[@]} ${DIST_PACKAGES}
             ;;
         *)
             echo "Unknown distro: ${distro}"