Whenever stock markets turn turbulent, talking heads’ textbook solution to beat the slide is to ‘shift to the defensives’ — which in a layman’s terms is just buy stocks of companies that produce goods which are consumed every day.That essentially is based on belief that people won’t stop brushing their teeth, or washing their clothes due to slowing economy.This time around there is no such recommendation. Probably, the answer lies in Baba Ramdev , the man behind Patanjali Ayurved Ltd which sells from noodles to shampoos.The yoga guru has turned out to be the worst disruptive force in two decades for the consumer goods industry that managements and investors are working overtime to figure out what kind of damage he would leave behind.And the numbers tell the story: This fiscal Patanjali may have a revenue of Rs 5,000 crore, more than Colgate, or GlaxoSmithKline, or Emami. IIFL , a brokerage, forecasts revenue at Rs 20,000 crore by 2020, two thirds of what Hindustan Unilever , founded in 1888, achieved last year.Of course, Ramdev’s products would not destroy every consumer goods maker, but some may get hit more than others — be it home grown, or a multinational.Investor hesitation to take the man from the foothills of Himalayas lightly is reflected in stock prices. Dabur, a prominent seller of honey; Agro Tech, the local unit of ConAgra Foods which sells Sundrop brand of sunflower oil; and toothpaste maker Colgate have lost more than a fifth of their value from their recent peak, higher than the benchmark.Patanjali, the brand named after an ancient scholar who compiled the yoga sutras, is advantaged in a sense that it doesn’t have the rigidities associated with MNCs, or any other established firm. “Professionals from elite MBA institutes are what most large FMCG companies employ, because they believe that knowledge is the edge,” says IIFL’s Percy Panthaki, in a note titled ‘Patanjali — Injurious to Listed FMCG Health’.“The salary to bepaid to these professionals is high.Patanjali has a lesser proportion of highly qualified professionals as it believes that its job is to produce and make available products to the consumer, and then it is the consumer’s choice to consume or not.”Ramdev’s growing clout is captured in the tie-up that Kishore Biyani’s Big Bazaar did to sell his products beyond its 10,000 dedicated distributors. Other shopkeepers may not be far behind to embrace the downmarket Patanjali ghee and shampoo when Ayurveda and health consciousness fad is gaining ground.Whatever the Communist Party of India (Marxist) could not achieve with their anti-MNC slogans for decades, they have done it through by bad mouthing Ramdev’s products, alleging it contained animal parts and human bones. In a way, Brinda Karat deserves credit for making Ramdev a successful entrepreneur.This is not the first time that FMCG companies are threatened by competition from an unknown quarter. They overcame Karsanbhai Patel of Nirma and CavinKare’s Ranganathan who rattled Hindustan Unilever with his Chik shampoo.Whatever happens in the next decade, the steep profitability of many of the consumer goods will get squeezed forcing investors to work hard. Ramdev is just the Black Swan that the Daburs and Colgates didn’t account for.