diff --git a/gramps/gen/utils/grampslocale.py b/gramps/gen/utils/grampslocale.py
index 439d2a3ef..61e3425fe 100644
--- a/gramps/gen/utils/grampslocale.py
+++ b/gramps/gen/utils/grampslocale.py
@@ -415,7 +415,10 @@ class GrampsLocale(object):
 #Ensure that output is encoded correctly to stdout and stderr. This is
 #much less cumbersome and error-prone than encoding individual outputs
 #and better handles the differences between Python 2 and Python 3:
-        _encoding = sys.stdout.encoding or sys.getdefaultencoding()
+        try:
+            _encoding = sys.stdout.encoding or sys.getdefaultencoding()
+        except:
+            _encoding = "UTF-8"
         if sys.version_info[0] < 3:
             sys.stdout = codecs.getwriter(_encoding)(sys.stdout,
                                                      'backslashreplace')