diff --git a/setupsrc/pypdfium2_setup/packaging_base.py b/setupsrc/pypdfium2_setup/packaging_base.py
index a8221a3ca..0fa1a6ed6 100644
--- a/setupsrc/pypdfium2_setup/packaging_base.py
+++ b/setupsrc/pypdfium2_setup/packaging_base.py
@@ -494,6 +494,7 @@ def build_pdfium_bindings(version, headers_dir=None, **kwargs):
         flags_diff = set(kwargs["flags"]).difference(REFBINDINGS_FLAGS)
         if flags_diff:  # == not set(...).issubset(...)
             print(f"Warning: The following requested flags are not available in the reference bindings and will be discarded: {flags_diff}")
+        DataDir_Bindings.mkdir(parents=True, exist_ok=True)
         shutil.copyfile(RefBindingsFile, DataDir_Bindings/BindingsFN)
         write_json(ver_path, dict(version=bindings_ver, flags=REFBINDINGS_FLAGS, run_lds=["."], source="reference"))
         return