diff --git a/lib/ansible/plugins/cache/jsonfile.py b/lib/ansible/plugins/cache/jsonfile.py
index 848e905de3..bf60fcf7f7 100644
--- a/lib/ansible/plugins/cache/jsonfile.py
+++ b/lib/ansible/plugins/cache/jsonfile.py
@@ -29,6 +29,8 @@ from ansible import constants as C
 from ansible.errors import *
 from ansible.parsing.utils.jsonify import jsonify
 from ansible.plugins.cache.base import BaseCacheModule
+from ansible.utils.unicode import to_bytes
+
 
 class CacheModule(BaseCacheModule):
     """
@@ -46,7 +48,7 @@ class CacheModule(BaseCacheModule):
             try:
                 os.makedirs(self._cache_dir)
             except (OSError,IOError) as e:
-                self._display.warning("error while trying to create cache dir %s : %s" % (self._cache_dir, str(e)))
+                self._display.warning("error while trying to create cache dir %s : %s" % (self._cache_dir, to_bytes(e)))
                 return None
 
     def get(self, key):
@@ -61,7 +63,7 @@ class CacheModule(BaseCacheModule):
         try:
             f = codecs.open(cachefile, 'r', encoding='utf-8')
         except (OSError,IOError) as e:
-            self._display.warning("error while trying to read %s : %s" % (cachefile, str(e)))
+            self._display.warning("error while trying to read %s : %s" % (cachefile, to_bytes(e)))
             pass
         else:
             try:
@@ -69,7 +71,7 @@ class CacheModule(BaseCacheModule):
                 self._cache[key] = value
                 return value
             except ValueError as e:
-                self._display.warning("error while trying to read %s : %s. Most likely a corrupt file, so erasing and failing." % (cachefile, str(e)))
+                self._display.warning("error while trying to read %s : %s. Most likely a corrupt file, so erasing and failing." % (cachefile, to_bytes(e)))
                 self.delete(key)
                 raise AnsibleError("The JSON cache file %s was corrupt, or did not otherwise contain valid JSON data. It has been removed, so you can re-run your command now." % cachefile)
         finally:
@@ -83,7 +85,7 @@ class CacheModule(BaseCacheModule):
         try:
             f = codecs.open(cachefile, 'w', encoding='utf-8')
         except (OSError,IOError) as e:
-            self._display.warning("error while trying to write to %s : %s" % (cachefile, str(e)))
+            self._display.warning("error while trying to write to %s : %s" % (cachefile, to_bytes(e)))
             pass
         else:
             f.write(jsonify(value))
@@ -99,7 +101,7 @@ class CacheModule(BaseCacheModule):
             if e.errno == errno.ENOENT:
                 return False
             else:
-                self._display.warning("error while trying to stat %s : %s" % (cachefile, str(e)))
+                self._display.warning("error while trying to stat %s : %s" % (cachefile, to_bytes(e)))
                 pass
 
         if time.time() - st.st_mtime <= self._timeout:
@@ -131,7 +133,7 @@ class CacheModule(BaseCacheModule):
             if e.errno == errno.ENOENT:
                 return False
             else:
-                self._display.warning("error while trying to stat %s : %s" % (cachefile, str(e)))
+                self._display.warning("error while trying to stat %s : %s" % (cachefile, to_bytes(e)))
                 pass
 
     def delete(self, key):