diff --git a/src/main.rs b/src/main.rs
index fda3a241..3d66e5ea 100644
--- a/src/main.rs
+++ b/src/main.rs
@@ -58,15 +58,16 @@ async fn try_main() -> Result<(), Box<dyn std::error::Error>> {
     clap::parse();
 
     // Initialize config
-    let raw_config =
-        Figment::new()
-            .merge(
-                Toml::file(Env::var("CONDUIT_CONFIG").ok_or(
-                    "The CONDUIT_CONFIG env var needs to be set. Example: /etc/conduit.toml",
-                )?)
-                .nested(),
-            )
-            .merge(Env::prefixed("CONDUIT_").global());
+    let raw_config = Figment::new()
+        .merge(
+            Toml::file(Env::var("CONDUIT_CONFIG").ok_or(
+                "the `CONDUIT_CONFIG` environment variable must either be set to a \
+                    configuration file path or set to the empty string to force configuration \
+                    through environment variables",
+            )?)
+            .nested(),
+        )
+        .merge(Env::prefixed("CONDUIT_").global());
 
     let config = raw_config.extract::<Config>()?;