As stated in the mailman FAQ, at least one message should have been sent before an archive is created. However, if you just run : $prefix/bin/arch listname $prefix/archives/private/listname.mbox then the archive is created even with zero messages and it displays : Currently, there are no archives.

Which is a perfect solution. Why not just add that line to the newlist-executable ?

Kind greetings,

Wim Godden