diff --git a/compose/const.py b/compose/const.py
index 479b6af45f..709c3a10d7 100644
--- a/compose/const.py
+++ b/compose/const.py
@@ -1,5 +1,4 @@
 
-DEFAULT_MAX_WORKERS = 20
 DEFAULT_TIMEOUT = 10
 LABEL_CONTAINER_NUMBER = 'com.docker.compose.container-number'
 LABEL_ONE_OFF = 'com.docker.compose.oneoff'
diff --git a/compose/utils.py b/compose/utils.py
index c3316ccda8..b6ee63d037 100644
--- a/compose/utils.py
+++ b/compose/utils.py
@@ -2,13 +2,11 @@ import codecs
 import hashlib
 import json
 import logging
-import os
 import sys
 
 from docker.errors import APIError
-import concurrent.futures
-
-from .const import DEFAULT_MAX_WORKERS
+from Queue import Queue, Empty
+from threading import Thread
 
 
 log = logging.getLogger(__name__)
@@ -18,7 +16,6 @@ def parallel_execute(command, containers, doing_msg, done_msg, **options):
     """
     Execute a given command upon a list of containers in parallel.
     """
-    max_workers = os.environ.get('COMPOSE_MAX_WORKERS', DEFAULT_MAX_WORKERS)
     stream = codecs.getwriter('utf-8')(sys.stdout)
     lines = []
     errors = {}
@@ -26,25 +23,33 @@ def parallel_execute(command, containers, doing_msg, done_msg, **options):
     for container in containers:
         write_out_msg(stream, lines, container.name, doing_msg)
 
+    q = Queue()
+
     def container_command_execute(container, command, **options):
         try:
             getattr(container, command)(**options)
         except APIError as e:
             errors[container.name] = e.explanation
+        q.put(container)
 
-    with concurrent.futures.ThreadPoolExecutor(max_workers=max_workers) as executor:
-        future_container = {
-            executor.submit(
-                container_command_execute,
-                container,
-                command,
-                **options
-            ): container for container in containers
-        }
+    for container in containers:
+        t = Thread(
+            target=container_command_execute,
+            args=(container, command),
+            kwargs=options,
+        )
+        t.daemon = True
+        t.start()
 
-        for future in concurrent.futures.as_completed(future_container):
-            container = future_container[future]
+    done = 0
+
+    while done < len(containers):
+        try:
+            container = q.get(timeout=1)
             write_out_msg(stream, lines, container.name, done_msg)
+            done += 1
+        except Empty:
+            pass
 
     if errors:
         for container in errors:
diff --git a/docs/reference/overview.md b/docs/reference/overview.md
index 561069df87..458dea4046 100644
--- a/docs/reference/overview.md
+++ b/docs/reference/overview.md
@@ -44,12 +44,6 @@ the `docker` daemon.
 
 Configures the path to the `ca.pem`, `cert.pem`, and `key.pem` files used for TLS verification. Defaults to `~/.docker`.
 
-### COMPOSE\_MAX\_WORKERS
-
-Configures the maximum number of worker threads to be used when executing
-commands in parallel. Only a subset of commands execute in parallel, `stop`,
-`kill` and `rm`.
-
 
 
 
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index dce583015b..fc5b68489c 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -2,7 +2,6 @@ PyYAML==3.10
 docker-py==1.3.0
 dockerpty==0.3.4
 docopt==0.6.1
-futures==3.0.3
 requests==2.6.1
 six==1.7.3
 texttable==0.8.2
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index 6ce7da44c6..d0ec106798 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -33,7 +33,6 @@ install_requires = [
     'docker-py >= 1.3.0, < 1.4',
     'dockerpty >= 0.3.4, < 0.4',
     'six >= 1.3.0, < 2',
-    'futures >= 3.0.3',
 ]