Glass beads are used to add reflectivity to traffic or marking paint. They are to be sprinkled on the surface of wet paint as soon after application as possible. Use about 5 pounds of glass beads for every one gallon of paint. Traffic Paint with pre-mixed beads is not immediately reflective because the glass spheres (beads) in the paint are surrounded by paint, which is opaque. The paint must be worn off the exposed tops of the beads (by traffic driving over the paint stripe) before the paint become reflective. However, once the paint stripe becomes reflective, it will continue to reflect as long as there is any paint with pre-mixed beads left on the road surface. Drop on beads provide immediate reflectivity, but once the drop on beads have worn off (by traffic driving over the paint stripe), the stripe will no longer be reflective, unless the paint originally contained pre-mixed beads also. 50# bag. Richards Paint.