diff --git a/ftest/crawlers/echojs.py b/ftest/crawlers/echojs.py
index c77db6fa11..ee93e0390e 100644
--- a/ftest/crawlers/echojs.py
+++ b/ftest/crawlers/echojs.py
@@ -48,7 +48,7 @@ def process(self, job: CrawlJob, response: Response) -> SpiderResult:
         next_links = response.soup().scrape("#newslist article > h2 > a[href]", "href")
         next_targets = [CrawlTarget(url=link) for link in next_links]
 
-        return job.group, next_targets
+        return None, next_targets
 
 
 class ArticleSpider(Spider):
diff --git a/minet/cli/crawl/crawl.py b/minet/cli/crawl/crawl.py
index 0d47fd0527..39fb52835d 100644
--- a/minet/cli/crawl/crawl.py
+++ b/minet/cli/crawl/crawl.py
@@ -67,19 +67,31 @@ def __init__(
         self.format = format
         self.dir = base_dir
 
+        if self.format not in ["csv", "jsonl", "ndjson"]:
+            raise NotImplementedError('unknown format "%s"' % self.format)
+
         if self.singular:
-            self.__add_file(None, "data", crawler.get_spider())
+            self.__register_file(None, "data", crawler.get_spider())
         else:
             for name, spider in crawler.spiders():
-                self.__add_file(name, join("data", name), spider)
+                self.__register_file(name, join("data", name), spider)
 
-    def __add_file(self, name: Optional[str], path: str, spider):
+    def __register_file(self, name: Optional[str], path: str, spider):
         path += "." + self.format
 
         path = join(self.dir, path)
         directory = dirname(path)
         os.makedirs(directory, exist_ok=True)
 
+        # NOTE: file will only be written on first write
+        self.handles[name] = {
+            "file": None,
+            "writer": None,
+            "spider": spider,
+            "path": path,
+        }
+
+    def __open(self, path: str):
         f = (
             casanova.BasicResumer(path, encoding="utf-8")
             if self.resume
@@ -92,9 +104,9 @@ def __add_file(self, name: Optional[str], path: str, spider):
         elif self.format == "jsonl" or self.format == "ndjson":
             w = ndjson.writer(f)
         else:
-            raise NotImplementedError('unknown format "%s"' % self.format)
+            raise NotImplementedError
 
-        self.handles[name] = {"file": f, "writer": w, "spider": spider}
+        return f, w
 
     def __unpack_result(self, result: SuccessfulCrawlResult, data):
         job_id = result.job.id
@@ -107,22 +119,30 @@ def __unpack_result(self, result: SuccessfulCrawlResult, data):
     def write(self, result: SuccessfulCrawlResult) -> None:
         handle = self.handles[result.spider]
         spider = handle["spider"]
-        writer = handle["writer"]
         f = handle["file"]
+        w = handle["writer"]
 
         for item in spider.tabulate(result):
-            writer.writerow(*self.__unpack_result(result, item))
+            if f is None:
+                f, w = self.__open(handle["path"])
+                handle["file"] = f
+                handle["writer"] = w
+
+            w.writerow(*self.__unpack_result(result, item))
 
         # NOTE: write is flushing to ensure atomicity as well as possible
-        f.flush()
+        if f is not None:
+            f.flush()
 
     def flush(self) -> None:
         for h in self.handles.values():
-            h["file"].flush()
+            if h["file"] is not None:
+                h["file"].flush()
 
     def close(self) -> None:
         for h in self.handles.values():
-            h["file"].close()
+            if h["file"] is not None:
+                h["file"].close()
 
 
 @with_defer()