diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index 2d7e8d2fc..6d9257522 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -20,6 +20,7 @@ PACKAGE_DATA = {'': ['*.pyx', '*.pxd', '*.txt', '*.tokens']}
 
 PACKAGES = [
     'spacy',
+    'spacy.data',
     'spacy.cli',
     'spacy.tokens',
     'spacy.en',
diff --git a/spacy/data/.empty b/spacy/data/__init__.py
similarity index 100%
rename from spacy/data/.empty
rename to spacy/data/__init__.py