diff --git a/CONTRIBUTING.md b/CONTRIBUTING.md
index 2192c5c1dc..77c42ba9d5 100644
--- a/CONTRIBUTING.md
+++ b/CONTRIBUTING.md
@@ -38,6 +38,12 @@ run:
 
     $ script/build -osarch="darwin/amd64"
 
+If you don't need to run the `docker build` to generate the image on each
+compile, i.e. if you have built the image already, you can skip the image build
+using the `SKIP_BUILD` environment variable, for instance:
+
+    $ SKIP_BUILD=1 script/build -osarch="darwin/amd64"
+
 If you have any questions we're in #docker-machine on Freenode.
 
 ## Unit Tests
diff --git a/script/build b/script/build
index 56fd71782d..115faf1ea1 100755
--- a/script/build
+++ b/script/build
@@ -13,6 +13,11 @@ else
     OS_ARCH_ARG=($2)
 fi
 
-docker build -t docker-machine .
+# Build Docker image unless we opt out of it
+if [[ -z "$SKIP_BUILD" ]]; then
+    docker build -t docker-machine .
+fi
+
+# Get rid of existing binaries
 rm -f docker-machine*
 docker run --rm -v `pwd`:/go/src/github.com/docker/machine docker-machine gox "${OS_PLATFORM_ARG[@]}" "${OS_ARCH_ARG[@]}" -output="docker-machine_{{.OS}}-{{.Arch}}" -ldflags="-w -X github.com/docker/machine/version.GITCOMMIT `git rev-parse --short HEAD`"