Special-case based on exception message

2 files changed, 11 insertions, 4 deletions

diff --git a/pip/req/req_install.py b/pip/req/req_install.py
index b41411a19..1d5ec5d20 100644
--- a/pip/req/req_install.py
+++ b/pip/req/req_install.py
@@ -344,10 +344,17 @@ class InstallRequirement(object):
         try:
             import setuptools  # noqa
         except ImportError as e:
+            # Python 2 and 3 variants:
+            if e.args[0] in (
+                    "No module named setuptools",
+                    "No module named 'setuptools'"):
+                suggestion = "Please install setuptools."
+            else:
+                suggestion = "Check your setuptools installation: %s" % e
             # Setuptools is not available
             raise InstallationError(
-                "Could not import setuptools (%s) which is required to "
-                "install from a source distribution" % e
+                "Could not import setuptools which is required to "
+                "install from a source distribution. %s" % suggestion
             )
 
         setup_file = 'setup.py'
diff --git a/tests/functional/test_install.py b/tests/functional/test_install.py
index 69ea940e3..47ca38cd4 100644
--- a/tests/functional/test_install.py
+++ b/tests/functional/test_install.py
@@ -26,8 +26,8 @@ def test_without_setuptools(script, data):
         expect_error=True,
     )
     assert (
-        "Could not import setuptools (No module named setuptools) which is "
-        "required to install from a source distribution"
+        "Could not import setuptools which is required to install from a "
+        "source distribution."
         in result.stderr
     )