diff --git a/ports/atlmfc/CONTROL b/ports/atlmfc/CONTROL
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..aff5c97aa6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/ports/atlmfc/CONTROL
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+Source: atlmfc
+Version: 0
+Description: a stub package that ensures VS has ATL/MFC installed.
diff --git a/ports/atlmfc/portfile.cmake b/ports/atlmfc/portfile.cmake
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..d11235dcc1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/ports/atlmfc/portfile.cmake
@@ -0,0 +1,10 @@
+find_path(AFXRES_H
+  NAMES afxres.h
+  PATHS $ENV{INCLUDE}
+)
+
+if(NOT AFXRES_H)
+  message(FATAL_ERROR "Unable to locate 'afxres.h'. Ensure you have installed the ATL/MFC component of Visual Studio.")
+endif()
+
+SET(VCPKG_POLICY_EMPTY_PACKAGE enabled)
diff --git a/ports/xalan-c/CONTROL b/ports/xalan-c/CONTROL
index 5936fc2f58..314ea1ecd2 100644
--- a/ports/xalan-c/CONTROL
+++ b/ports/xalan-c/CONTROL
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
 Source: xalan-c
 Version: 1.11-1
 Description: Xalan is an XSLT processor for transforming XML documents into HTML, text, or other XML document types
-Build-Depends: xerces-c
+Build-Depends: xerces-c, atlmfc