diff --git a/pkgs/by-name/dd/ddccontrol/package.nix b/pkgs/by-name/dd/ddccontrol/package.nix
index 57b148c4ce92..31279ec0d5ea 100644
--- a/pkgs/by-name/dd/ddccontrol/package.nix
+++ b/pkgs/by-name/dd/ddccontrol/package.nix
@@ -41,7 +41,7 @@ stdenv.mkDerivation (finalAttrs: {
 
   prePatch = ''
     substituteInPlace configure.ac              \
-      --replace                                 \
+      --replace-fail                            \
       "\$""{datadir}/ddccontrol-db"             \
       "${ddccontrol-db}/share/ddccontrol-db"